Ninety seconds could have saved lives on Baltimore bridge, probe into 2024 disaster finds

In March 2024, the cargo ship Dali experienced an electrical blackout about 10 hours before leaving the Port of Baltimore and again shortly before it slammed into the Francis Key Bridge and killed six construction workers. Photo / Getty Images

Six workers who perished when a container ship struck a bridge in Maryland 20 months ago might not have died had they been alerted immediately of impending disaster, the United States National Transportation Safety Board said today.

One minute and 29 seconds elapsed between the time police were told to block bridge-bound traffic and the moment the ship struck the bridge, NTSB officials heard, as investigative findings were presented and endorsed at a public board meeting.

Had they been notified about the same time police were, “the highway workers may have had sufficient time to drive to a portion of the bridge that did not collapse”, officials said.

On March 26, 2024, the Dali, a 300m Singapore-flagged container ship, suffered a series of electrical problems and crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge over the Patapsco River in Maryland, which collapsed like a house of cards.

Six workers on the deck of the bridge, all Latin American immigrants, fell to their deaths.

The NTSB found that the “probable cause” of the disaster was loss of electrical power due to a loose signal wire connection, resulting in the vessel’s loss of propulsion and steering as it approached the bridge.

Maryland authorities had failed to conduct a vulnerability assessment of the bridge, which would have set the stage for repairs, the report said.

“Also contributing to the loss of life was the lack of effective and immediate communications to notify the highway workers to evacuate the bridge,” it said.

The NTSB has compiled a list of about a dozen American bridges that are at risk of collapse in the event of a collision with an ocean-going vessel.

They include both spans of a bridge across the Chesapeake Bay east of Washington, two bridges in the Philadelphia area and four over the Mississippi River in the southern state of Louisiana.

Vulnerability assessments are still under way for about 30 other bridges out of 68 that the NTSB earlier identified as potentially at risk of collapse in a similar scenario.

Yesterday, Maryland authorities said that the cost of repair of the Francis Scott Key Bridge had more than doubled to between US$4.3 and 5.2 billion, with completion now envisioned in 2030 instead of 2028.

-Agence France-Presse