Baltimore Bridge collapse

[Sooner or later]

The National Transportation Safety Board chair told CNN that investigators were able to board the ship overnight and obtain the data recorder, or black box, and more information will be shared with the public later today

[greglepore]

Originally Posted by 911 Rod

Apparently the ship did not lose power. The lights flickered because at that point they went full reverse and drained all the power to the electrical system. Like how your lights flicker when the microwave turns on.

I'm surprised the ship stopped at the pillar and didn't just keep going. This tells me that bollards would could stop a ship.

Source? No major outlet is reporting this that I've seen.

[Zeke]

Originally Posted by 911 Rod

Apparently the ship did not lose power. The lights flickered because at that point they went full reverse and drained all the power to the electrical system. Like how your lights flicker when the microwave turns on.

I'm surprised the ship stopped at the pillar and didn't just keep going. This tells me that bollards would could stop a ship.

It was reported that they had time to drop anchors. They dragged them as well, they were not found to be in the vertical position. Hard to know the sequences that led to the collision at this point.

Also reported that the ship radioed "mayday" and the bridge operators were able to close the toll gates somehow. Maybe none of this is true. News media.

[Sooner or later]

Police audio of the police trying to stop traffic along with report of bridge actual collapse.

https://twitter.com/ExposeDemLies/status/1772803374666125735

[911 Rod]

Originally Posted by greglepore

Source? No major outlet is reporting this that I've seen.

One of the many YouTubes I've watched on this. Sorry, don't remember which one. Some expert nautical guy.

[Seahawk]

I qualified as an Officer of the Deck Underway (OOD) during my Airboss tour on a Gator.

I had my own Watch Section:

"Attention in the pilot house, LT Seahawk has the deck, belay all reports."

The Dali is easily 15 times the weight and mass of what I drove, with a huge "sail area" (container ships are really susceptible to winds, just like the Gator I was on). It is going to carry mass, regardless of speed, that will stop only after it gets tired or it meets a like mass.

Like driving an old 911, everything happens fast, slowly, when coming into or out of port. There are always Harbor Pilots onboard, even on the Navy ship I was on. Local course rules.

I have no idea how the merchant fleet does their job, but I am sure they rehearse just like we did: Sea and Anchor Detail was real and hard.

All that said, like aviation accidents, this tragedy investigation will hopefully play out with facts not supposition.

BTW, setting an anchor is not easy and a last ditch effort.

[speeder]

Hard to believe that something like this could happen when we're talking about people who have done their jobs for a long time and what looks in the video like not a small passage that they had to navigate. They were really off by a mile, so to speak.

I've seen a bridge disaster over water up close and personal, Minneapolis 35W bridge over the Mississippi River in 2007. I had just ridden over it on a motorcycle 30 minutes earlier, perfect summer day but lots of construction equipment on the bridge with the inside lanes closed and filled with paving trucks, jackhammer crews, etc.

I got home to my crib and called a friend in CA., when I told him that I was in Mpls, he asked about the bridge. "What bridge?" He told me to open my laptop or turn on the TV, when I did, I nearly shat my pants. I had just crossed it. I raced back down there and the scene was like 9/11 in NYC, full-on disaster response with hundreds of firefighters and cops working and both sides of the freeway bridge down in the water. Lots of dead people. It happened during afternoon rush hour. I remember Police SUVs pulling trailers with small boats rushing in from surrounding areas.

The tonnage of wreckage was mind-blowing but fortunately, the actual death toll was less than expected. I have photos somewhere on an old device, I'll try to dig them up. I feel for the people who perished, what a terrible way to die.

[unclebilly]

Originally Posted by Seahawk

I qualified as an Officer of the Deck Underway (OOD) during my Airboss tour on a Gator.

I had my own Watch Section:

"Attention in the pilot house, LT Seahawk has the deck, belay all reports."

The Dali is easily 15 times the weight and mass of what I drove, with a huge "sail area" (container ships are really susceptible to winds, just like the Gator I was on). It is going to carry mass, regardless of speed, that will stop only after it gets tired or it meets a like mass.

Like driving an old 911, everything happens fast, slowly, when coming into or out of port. There are always Harbor Pilots onboard, even on the Navy ship I was on. Local course rules.

I have no idea how the merchant fleet does their job, but I am sure they rehearse just like we did: Sea and Anchor Detail was real and hard.

All that said, like aviation accidents, this tragedy investigation will hopefully play out with facts not supposition.

BTW, setting an anchor is not easy and a last ditch effort.

I’m thinking like you. Biggest boat I ‘drove’ was a little bigger than 1/20th the size of the Dali. The windage is a massive factor. Momentum and currents are everything else. When you don’t have power you can’t steer the bisch…

[jyl]

Bridges this size are huge projects that take a very long time, but in this case there is great urgency, no seismic issues, and the infrastructure bill passed a couple years ago will provide lots of Federal money. Maybe it can be done in 2-3 years?

It took a decade to replace the Bay Bridge eastern span after the Loma Prieta earthquake, but the initial repair was done in a couple months and the bridge was operable albeit vulnerable, so the urgency wasn’t all there.

[KFC911]

I suspect they will have the shipping channel back open in a matter of days. Mebbe a week or two at most... jmo.

[Seahawk]

Originally Posted by KC911

I suspect they will have the shipping channel back open in a matter of days. Mebbe a week or two at most... jmo.

I agree. They will have it open.

The bridge? Who knows.

[stevej37]

Uh-Oh....
https://www.yahoo.com/news/cargo-giant-took-bridge-had-164643466.html

[TimT]

This is a photo from a project I was involved with.. After 9/11 it was mandated that infrastructure in the metro NY area be hardened.

I.E. cables/supports etc... in a defined blast zone were protected..

Protection of piers and columns....

This is a robust pier protection system.. ironically the largest vessel this system may have to fend off is a 75' charter fishing boat..

Sheet piling, piles driven to refusal, reinforced concrete . and a composite piles and walers..

I doubt this could have prevented the impact

[TimT]

Design of the replacement is probably already under way.. agencies like the DOT and FHWA have "on-call" engineering firms...and I bet if I called some of the larger steel fab shops I've dealt with, they have already been notified that they may need to to shuffle the schedules for fab jobs..

Companies like American Bridge and Kiewit are probably tooling up....

[Steve Carlton]

Good quality video here. The collision starts at around 5:35. I didn't see any traffic on the bridge after 5:00. You can see the lights go out on the ship around 3:30 then come back on.

[HardDrive]

Originally Posted by 911 Rod

Apparently the ship did not lose power. The lights flickered because at that point they went full reverse and drained all the power to the electrical system. Like how your lights flicker when the microwave turns on.

The ship lost power, and the emergency generators came online. There is a delay before they can spin up. So the ship had electric, but did not have engine power.

[HardDrive]

Really curious what comes next here in the effort to clear the scene. Time is money. Bay is shallow, so the steel needs to come out, you can't just blow it up and sink it. I will be genuinely fascinated to see how they proceed.

[serene911]

They have a few barges with salvage cranes on the way. The cranes are capable of lifting
a very large amount of weight.

[craigster59]

Originally Posted by HardDrive

Really curious what comes next here in the effort to clear the scene. Time is money. Bay is shallow, so the steel needs to come out, you can't just blow it up and sink it. I will be genuinely fascinated to see how they proceed.

As a former Combat Engineer, we were tasked with blowing up bridges and then “bridging the gap” with Bailey Bridge after the fact which was like putting together a Gilbert Erector Set.

You can put up a temporary one way crossing while you are erecting a permanent structure but you have to be able to give access to maritime traffic during construction.

Maybe Vash will swing by and give his input, this is more in his wheelhouse.

[URY914]

There is a bridge here in Jacksonville that is the same design as the Key. Compare the below pic with the pic of the Key above. For what it's worth....