Disaster "Mass casualty incident" declared after Key Bridge in Baltimore collapses

No article yet as this just happened, but could be big. One of the largest bridges in the world according to Wikipedia.

https://foxbaltimore.com/news/local/breaking-news-key-bridge-collapsed

 

[draggs]

This isn't about durability. It's about structural integrity, of which truss bridges have very little. The ship collided with the truss support, and the entire truss collapsed.
View attachment 5850622
The exact same thing would have happened here if any of the supports on the left were struck.

You're arguing about irrelevancies bro

There seems to be a miscommunication, unless I misunderstand Pierre. I believe he is saying that other bridges could've had less of a catastrophic collapse. Any bridge would collapse under this circumstance, and there's no way around it, but a truss bridge is more prone to massive collapses like this in these disaster scenarios. There are other types of bridges where less of the bridge would've collapsed.

Depends on how many piers there are on the bridge. Look at the Golden Gate Bridge, suspension bridge, it has two piers (technically four I guess). If one pair goes down the same thing happens. Its piers are much, much more massive though

 

[glass_houses]

One thing some other countries have is a “fuck the bridge is gonna blow” emergency systems where they can shut down the bridge at a moment’s notice - alarms bellow and crossing guards go down and traffic no longer enters.

Something like that here could have helped - depending on when the warning went out.

Yes- this-

We have a fuckhuge bridge going over the river where I live, and the entire motorway running off of it is full of cameras, electronic road signs, loudspeakers etc. The traffic going over that bridge is highly monitored and controlled, and the very second there's drama, entry is barred and the traffic already on it can be stopped, shunted to another lane, or gtfo asap.

If the Baltimore harbour master knew that the cargo ship was rudderless under power, entry to the bridge should have been immediately restricted. Basically stopping at a traffic light, but watching the video of the ship approaching the bridge, multiple vehicles kept moving over it regardless. The ship is not the only cause of casualties here.

 

[Poppavalyim Andropoff]

ship fuel melts steel beams?

as long as Slim Charles got the connect first ...

 

[Chongqing]

The collapse of the west demonstrated as clearly as day, ironic cause it happened at night. How much longer will it take us today to rebuild this infrastructure as fast as it's falling? Wasn't even taking ship ramming into account before now. RIP anyone stuck blind on that bridge and not even knowing what happened as they fell into the fucking void. Awful.

An awful part about it that the powers that be will attach any solutions to racial equity and removing racist sidewalks and shit.

 

[White Trash Motorsport]

Why is everyone saying it sank. It's clearly still there in the middle of picture on the live stream.

Probably because earlier all we had was limited footage, it was dark, and reports were saying the ship was taking in water, so it wasn’t a great leap to assume the hull was breached. Also, sinking doesn’t necessarily mean dropping to the bottom like a cartoon pirate ship, the Port McHenry Channel has a mean depth of 50ft, so a large container ship could be rested on the seabed and the majority of the ship would still be above water, the risk would be it listing to the side.

Now we have more information and it’s looking like the biggest issue is that the 1970s bridge hadn’t been adapted to withstand a collision by the sort of fucking huge container ships we have now. This one wasn’t even the largest type at 300m, when 400m container ships are fairly common.
The bridge supports had no protection, which seems crazy in a busy shipping channel. I suspect this’ll be yet another case of hideous disaster caused by lack of investment.

 

[a terminal posture]

But it was. Truss bridges are like that pretty much by design. Something breaks and the whole thing collapses. It was known around 20 years before that one was built.

This isn't about durability. It's about structural integrity, of which truss bridges have very little. The ship collided with the truss support, and the entire truss collapsed.
View attachment 5850622
The exact same thing would have happened here if any of the supports on the left were struck.

The total collapse had nothing to do with it being a truss. It happened because the end pier collapsed when the third span fell back on it after teeter-tottering. Which is not the result I would have expected. If the pier had stood up then there would be a good chance the third span would still be standing.

 

[Sad Chad]

Not to kill everyone's DEI theories, but I can tell you right now that there is a 99% chance that the pilot was an old white dude. His father was a pilot, his father's father was a pilot, and his father was probably an old fishing captain out of Norway or something. I've literally never seen or heard of a black state pilot.

 

[Black Spruce]

I'm betting woman. Women have a history of collapsing bridges.

 

[CHARizard]

Now reports theres an odor from the ship, MDE (Maryland Department of the Environment) is on the scene investigating.

Before people roll their eyes just remember that the health of the Chesapeake Bay is a major concern for the area, I mentioned it before but many workers rely on the food that comes from the bay.

 

[Bec Noir]

Yes- this-

We have a fuckhuge bridge going over the river where I live, and the entire motorway running off of it is full of cameras, electronic road signs, loudspeakers etc. The traffic going over that bridge is highly monitored and controlled, and the very second there's drama, entry is barred and the traffic already on it can be stopped, shunted to another lane, or gtfo asap.

If the Baltimore harbour master knew that the cargo ship was rudderless under power, entry to the bridge should have been immediately restricted. Basically stopping at a traffic light, but watching the video of the ship approaching the bridge, multiple vehicles kept moving over it regardless. The ship is not the only cause of casualties here.

Is that in the US?

 

[Catch The Rainbow]

Give me a single incident where a ship collision caused the entire bridge to collapse, all i got is partial collapses, exactly what I was talking about.
Here just a few weeks ago a container ship collided with a bridge in china, only a partial collapse:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/world/asia/china-bridge-collapse-ship.html

View attachment 5850403

This is poor engineering.

Political retard turns out to be a retard in all aspects of life, classic. This bridge was built in 1972 before the 1980 accident that led to rethinking how bridges should withstand accidents and is a completely different kind of bridge from the Chinese one.

Cs might get degrees but I'd rather have my infrastructure built by Shaniqua than you. You can train stupid to perform a task correctly but you can't train stupid and arrogant.

 

[CHARizard]

Governor is giving a press conference now.

 

[Swingletonthesimpleton]

And mother would always mock me when i said bridges were dangerous. This is why i don't travel.

 

[Pierre D'Olnique]

You're arguing about irrelevancies bro

But of course it's irrelevant now that you've been proven wrong.
The weight and speed of the ship are a moot point. Any bridge would have sustained heavy damage and had its bits collapse. But only a truss bridge would collapse in its entirety, which is what that section was.

The total collapse had nothing to do with it being a truss. It happened because the end pier collapsed when the third span fell back on it after teeter-tottering. Which is not the result I would have expected. If the pier had stood up then there would be a good chance the third span would still be standing.

Wrong. That's exactly why the whole thing collapsed. Had it been a beam bridge, you'd see the damage similar to that chink crash mentioned earlier in the thread.

 

[glass_houses]

Is that in the US?

No.

 

[Chongqing]

Carnival can't catch a break. Their ship is one of the only ones that uses Baltimore as a home port. A few days ago another of their ships caught on fire at sea and was on fire for hours while passengers freaked out below decks.

I definitely wonder about the possibility of a cyberattack against this bridge. With all the tech out there to know exactly where ships are at any given time, cutting the power at just the right moment could be within the realm of possibility for attackers. If so, we're in a new era and shit's going to get a lot worse.

It's amazing that Ukraine has been trying to do this for two years with the Kerch Bridge, but has failed. Then this happens here by accident.

Very suspicious, right?

Edit to add: can the people who disagree or think this is dumb please explain why? Structural engineering is not common knowledge.

 

[Mark Goldbridge]

There were no dolphins around the bridge because it was in a shit area of a shit city where nobody gives a fuck and nobody can afford shit. This will ruin Baltimore even worse, an already bankrupt city. This will lead to really serious civil unrest in a couple months/years I guarantee it with the port being closed for weeks.

Love you Baltimore

 

[Vinluv Handesbukia]

Underwater tunnels are where it’s at. Luv me chunnel.

 

[MadStan]

Ah america, where it funds top dollar infrastructure, free education,security, and healthcare everywhere else but it in its own soil because reasons, and both democrats and republicans seriously believe it can't be done.

I need not to remind, that whoever was at the helm isn't responsible, yes he is a fucking moron, but bridges shouldn't collapse entirely specially ones in a harbor against a ship slowly moving.

Bridges are supposed to collapse in stages, not all sections at basically the same time, there are bridges in Vietnam who got bombed for 7 years straight and remained operational, the Crimean bridge had a truck full of explosives blow off a section of it, but it was quickly rebuilt.


I'm an engineering student, this shit screams either poor upkeep or poor design who doesn't account for redundancies, which is a e key aspect of civil engineering.

If you are an engineering student then I’m huckleberry Finn. You compare a bridge in Vietnam to a 100,000 ton ship hitting a support pier of a giant bridge that just had one of 2 main support columns smashed with (I’ll say it again) 100,000 tons or so of inertia? And are curious as to why an immense span can’t hold the load?

Go back and redo your physics course.

 

[White Trash Motorsport]

Now reports theres an odor from the ship, MDE (Maryland Department of the Environment) is on the scene investigating.

Before people roll their eyes just remember that the health of the Chesapeake Bay is a major concern for the area, I mentioned it before but many workers rely on the food that comes from the bay.

If it’s leaking fuel this is very bad news, ships run on HFO and it’s filthy gack