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The Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed early Tuesday after a massive container ship lost power and crashed into the iconic Baltimore bridge, sending people and vehicles into the frigid Patapsco River.
Six people, believed to be part of a road construction crew, are presumed dead and the Coast Guard has ended its active search and rescue mission.
This is about 5 miles from me and about 1.5 miles form my youngest daughter. The collapse was so incredible that they heard the collapse clearly at her apartment. There are numerous videos posted from a monitoring feed.
At least 6 workers presumed dead and an unknown amount of vehicles were crossing the bridge when it collapsed. It collapsed at 1:50am so traffic was as light as it ever gets. Haven driven that bridge many a time I know by 6am it is packed and dozens of cars on each span at any time.
This is a picture I took myself around 4pm or so.
Disciple of the cross and champion in suffering
Immerse yourself into the kingdom of redemption
Pardon your mind through the chains of the divine
Make way, the shepherd of fire
BALTIMORE (AP) — A crane that can lift 1,000 tons, described as one of the largest on the Eastern Seaboard, appeared near the site of a collapsed highway bridge in Baltimore as crews prepared Friday to begin clearing wreckage that has stymied the search for four workers missing and presumed dead and blocked ships from entering or leaving the city’s vital port.
Disciple of the cross and champion in suffering
Immerse yourself into the kingdom of redemption
Pardon your mind through the chains of the divine
Make way, the shepherd of fire
The USS Kearsarge, named after the frigate which defeated the CSS Alabama off Cherbourg in 1864, was the only US battleship not named for a state. It was made obsolete by the advent of the dreadnought battleships; and by the time that the US entered World War I, the Kearsarge was used only for training. She was converted to a crane ship in 1920, and served until 1955 when she was sold and scrapped (in the late 50s, my father showed me a piece of metal, about an inch thick, about 8 inches in diameter with a hole cut through the middle with a cutting torch. I wish that I had it, because I now wonder if it came from the ex-Kearsarge.
I say all this because I wonder if some of the larger Navy ships which have exceeded their usefulness as warships, and are capable of conversion, could be converted in this manner, and sold to raise money for Uncle Sam.
"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture." -- Pastor Ray Mummert, Dover, PA, during an attempt to introduce creationism -- er, "intelligent design", into the Dover Public Schools
I was out taking pictures of the crane working yesterday and ran into a Longshoreman doing the same thing. Got talking to him and he alluded that a large salvage company has been contacted to do the clean up since nothing local is large enough. Part of his speculation was that that the salvage company would have the rights to whatever they remove. We also discussed how they would transport that much metal since everything would have to be loaded onto barges and he believed they could float the barges over to Dundalk, where I worked 30 odd years ago, and use the gantries there to load the metal onto trucks. Definitely a huge effort is going to be required. Some of the pics I took had Coast Guard ships doing rescue ops and the girders laying on the container ship dwarf them. Someone took the time to calculate a rough estimate of the weight of what needs removed and it's a pretty big number.
Disciple of the cross and champion in suffering
Immerse yourself into the kingdom of redemption
Pardon your mind through the chains of the divine
Make way, the shepherd of fire
