this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2024
799 points (99.5% liked)

News

23376 readers
3939 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

A portion of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore has collapsed after a large boat collided with it early on Tuesday morning, sending multiple vehicles into the water.

At about 1.30am, a vessel crashed into the bridge, catching fire before sinking and causing multiple vehicles to fall into the water below, according to a video posted on X.

“All lanes closed both directions for incident on I-695 Key Bridge. Traffic is being detoured,” the Maryland Transportation Authority posted on X.

Matthew West, a petty officer first class for the coastguard in Baltimore, told the New York Times that the coastguard received a report of an impact at 1.27am ET. West said the Dali, a 948ft (29 metres) Singapore-flagged cargo ship, had hit the bridge, which is part of Interstate 695.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] grue@lemmy.world 133 points 8 months ago (3 children)

I'm pretty sure no bridge is designed to survive a collision with a large cargo ship, even a brand new one. It would balloon the cost so much nobody would be willing to pay it.

[–] You999@sh.itjust.works 64 points 8 months ago (2 children)

New bridges are built with protections such as pylons to prevent ships from even getting close to bumping into the bridge after the sunshine skyway bridge collapse of 1980.

[–] Socsa@sh.itjust.works 13 points 8 months ago (1 children)

In this case I'm not sure it would have mattered. This wasn't a bump or a glancing blow. There's not much which will deflect or absorb that much energy head on.

[–] You999@sh.itjust.works 12 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

I disagree, the geometry of protection dolphins use would deflect the ship enough to change its trajectory towards the walls of the channel bed where the ship would run aground before striking the bridge even from a head on collision.

[–] Blumpkinhead@lemmy.world 11 points 8 months ago (2 children)

What is a geometry protection dolphin?

[–] You999@sh.itjust.works 18 points 8 months ago (1 children)

They are concrete or wooden structures that are piled deep into the ground like fondation foundation pylons on skyscrapers. The geometry part I was just referring to how they are angled in such a way it ricochets the ship away from the structure it's protecting or towards the channel.

[–] kaboom36@ani.social 1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

So why on earth didn't the bridge have these?

[–] You999@sh.itjust.works 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

If I had to speculate? Cost savings... The bridge already had a history of cost reductions such as originally being built with a shared approach way which vastly increased the risk of head on collisions.

While the Key Bridge was built as a four-lane bridge, its approaches were kept to two lanes to save money

[–] kaboom36@ani.social 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

So in their effort to save money, they got 6 people killed and now have to spend presumably much more on a whole new bridge...

[–] You999@sh.itjust.works 3 points 8 months ago

Possibly but you have to keep in mind this bridge was designed in the late 60s when a lot of the safety regulations that were written in blood hadn't happened yet. The Florida state sunshine skyway bridge collapse wouldn't happen for over a decade after the Francis Scott Key bridge opened.

[–] drphungky@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago

A. It did, just only a few and the investigation will probably reveal not enough based on giant ships these days.

B. It was built before the Sunshine bridge collapse in 1980 so before the standards were updated.

[–] Dark_Arc@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

This makes a lot of sense, thanks for the insight!

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 22 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I suspect there'll be a lot of places taking a good long look at their current chunks of concrete they put around bridge supports and wondering how they'd stand up to the monstrous ships that are now the norm.

This kind of incident may not happen often but it does happen.

[–] skulblaka@startrek.website 30 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I imagine a lot of places may wonder about this and then kick that can down the road until someone does actually collide with their bridge.

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 13 points 8 months ago

!remindme 40 years.

A bridge is quite different to a pylon though.

Literally a block of concrete embedded in the sea floor.