In the wake of the Francis Scott Key Bridge’s shocking pre-dawn collapse, engineers are revealing the 1.6-mile long structure lacked proper safety features that would have prevented the low-speed container ship crash from turning into a tragedy.
The Maryland bridge is not the first to crumble after being struck by a massive boat – colossal infrastructure in Kentucky, Oklahoma, Georgia and Florida have suffered similar fates.
However, there are many other bridges across the nation that were built with necessary anti-collision devices that have stopped rogue ships from taking them down.
Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Maryland had considered installing protective structures around the Francis Scott Key Bridge, but decided against it due to the high cost of at least $3 million.
Multiple states including Delaware and Arkansas issued statements after the crash, reassuring the public that existing bridges are safe and that ongoing safety update projects are proceeding as planned.
The ship involved in the collapse of the bridge is 948 foot long Dali, a Singaporean-flagged container
A U.S. Coast Guard boat heads toward the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge wreckage on Tuesday March 26, 2024
If appropriate protection structures had been in place, it’s possible that the Francis Scott Key Bridge would have survived the crash, experts told DailyMail.com.
These devices, including pier fenders and protection cells, flank the bridge’s support pillars to ensure that most boats can’t even get close enough to damage the structures.
Fenders can absorb 70 percent of the impact from a wayward barge, according to a study from the Florida Department of Transportation. And as long as the boat isn’t heading straight for the structure, ‘it is capable of redirecting the barge and saving the bridge pier.’
Here are four cases where US bridges suffered the same fate as the Francis Scott Key Bridge – and four where bridges survived thanks to being protected:
Eggner’s Ferry Bridge in Kentucky: 2012
On January 26, 2012, a cargo ship destroyed two spans of the Eggner’s Ferry Bridge when it attempted to pass beneath.
But a the ship was too high in the water, and it tore more than 300 feet of the bridge’s span down.
The bridge crosses Kentucky Lake, connecting Trigg and Marshall counties.
A portion of the bridge collapsed onto the ship’s bow after the strike, and traffic in both directions screeched to a halt. Fortunately there were no injuries or deaths.
The 312-foot-long cargo vessel Delta Mariner was used to ship rocket parts for the Delta and Atlas launch systems.
In this file photo from January 27, 2012, the Delta Mariner is idle at the Eggner Ferry Bridge, with two destroyed spans of the bridge draped over her bow
The Coast Guard towboat Cimmaron pulled up to the idled Delta Mariner four days after it crashed into the bridge, taking down more than 300 feet of the bridge’s span
The 8,400-ton cargo ship was on its way to Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying rocket parts from a manufacturing facility in Alabama, on the fateful day.
Investigators found that Delta Mariner was traveling in a recreational channel on the Tennessee River.
Recreational channels are shallower than the shipping channels the boat was supposed to use.
Reports claimed that the warning lights supposed to be in place on the bridge were not functional, a claim the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet disputed.
Hundreds of students and nurses in the surrounding area who depended on the bridge for their commutes had to add an hour or more of driving time for the five months the bridge was being repaired, creating a burden for them at the fuel pumps.
In March of that year, the Transportation Cabinet awarded a $7 million repair contract to Hall Contracting of Kentucky, Inc.
It reopened on May 25, 2012.
I-40 Webbers Falls Bridge in Oklahoma: 2022
On the morning of May 26, 2002, a barge allided with one of the main support piers holding up the I-40 Bridge near Webbers Falls, Oklahoma.
As the pier gave out, 580 feet of the bridge fell into the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River.
The tumbling bridge span took eight passenger vehicles, a horse trailer, and three tractor-trailers into the water with it, leaving 14 people dead and 11 injured.
Investigations revealed that the captain of the towboat hauling barges upstream suddenly lost consciousness, sending the boat and its barges drifting wildly.
The I-40 bridge over the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River gave out when a wayward barge struck a pier. Fourteen people died in the accident
The bridge had concrete-filled protection cells in place, but they only protected the piers near the central navigation channel under the bridge.
Because the boat went so far off course, it hit one of the smaller, unprotected piers closer to shore.
Some of the cars that crashed had not stopped in time and drove into the water or fell onto the pieces of the collapsed bridge.
Nearby bass fishermen competing in a tournament rushed to the site to help rescue survivors.
Victims’ surviving family members sued the company that operated the tugboat, settling for an undisclosed amount in 2003.
I-40 spans 331 miles across Oklahoma. Nationally, it is an economically valuable trucking route, connecting the east and west coasts of the country and carrying more than $380 billion of economic value per year.
It took only two months for Gilbert Central Corp. of Fort Worth, Texas, to rebuild the bridge, earning them a $1.5 million bonus on top of the contracted $10.9 million paid by the state and federal governments.
Sunshine Skyway Bridge collapse in Florida: 1980
A car is seen halted at the edge of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge across Tampa Bay, Fla., after the freighter Summit Venture struck the bridge during a thunderstorm and tore away a large part of the span, May 9, 1980
On the morning of May 9, 1980, the freighter Summit Venture hit the Sunshine Skyway Bridge in Florida.
The crash knocked out a support column, crumbling more than 1,200 feet of roadway – much like what happened to the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
Some drivers fell into the water on the collapsed roadway, while others did not see that the roadway had fallen away and drove off the edge.
In all, 35 people died.
Investigators ruled the tragedy an ‘act of God,’ because a sudden squall had pushed the boat into the bridge with 70 mph winds.
Still, pilot John Lerro, never got over the crash, and friends reported that he talked about it until the day he died.
The one survivor, Wesley MacIntire, sued the company that owned the ship and won a $175,000 settlement in 1984.
The silver lining, though, was that this crash led to many new regulations in bridge building requiring protective structures. Unfortunately the Francis Scott Key Bridge, opened in 1977, did not benefit from them.
Construction took seven years, partly because the new bridge included massive concrete fenders to protect the support piers designed to withstand impacts from 87,000-ton ships. The old bridge was dismantled, not repaired.
The project ended up costing about $244 million, partly pushed upward by multiple weather-related construction delays. Today, it carries over 50,000 commuters across Tampa Bay each day.
Sidney Lanier Bridge collapse in Georgia: 1972
On November 7, 1972, the steamship African Neptune slammed into the Sidney Lanier Bridge.
The bridge was a drawbridge, and the operator had lifted the span for the ship to pass through.
But the crew had misjudged the opening, and missed it by several hundred feet.
The Sidney Lanier Bridge in Georgia was badly damaged in 1972 when the African Neptune slammed into it, after a steering error caused it to miss the drawbridge opening.
Ten people died and 11 were injured after their cars and trucks were plunged into the Brunswick River.
At the time, observers reported that the African Neptune’s crew dropped the anchor once they saw what was happening, but the anchor could not stop the ship.
It took down three of the bridge’s spans, sending 10 cars on Highway 17 into the Brunswick River in Georgia.
The accident killed 10 people and injured 11.
An investigation later revealed that the helmsman caused the crash by turning the rudder to the right – instead of to the left as ordered by then pilot.
The bridge was closed to highway traffic for about six months, and the total repair cost was around $1.3 million.
Highway 17 was used for local commuter traffic and as a passageway to nearby Interstate 95, which carried more economically important trucking freight.
Skyway Bridge crash in Florida: 1987
The Sunshine Skyway Bridge, seen in the current day rebuilt after the 1980 collapse. In 1987, a shrimp boat crash put the new safety measures to the test.
Seven years after the notorious Sunshine Skyway Bridge collapse that changed modern bridge building, a boat hit the bridge – the day before its opening ceremony.
This time, though, the bridge stood up to the boat.
On April 29, 1987, a 73-foot shrimp boat called The Deliverance struck one of the new concrete bumpers protecting the bridge’s piers.
These bumpers were some of the protective structures installed during the $240 million rebuild following the 1980 collapse.
By that time, such protective structures had become the norm, since the disaster pushed regulators and engineers to rethink safety in an age of massive ships that can destroy bridges with ease.
The Deliverance’s crew was unharmed – as was the rebuilt Sunshine Skyway bridge – but the boat had a 12- to 14-foot gash in it from the crash, according to a news report at the time, and it quickly began to sink.
San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge: Near miss 2007
A 2007 boat crash in San Francisco Bay demonstrated just how important protective structures are for major bridges.
On November 7 of that year, a foggy day, the container ship Cosco Busan ran into one of the fenders protecting the piers of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.
The fender was damaged, but the bridge was not.
The Hanjin container ship, Cosco Busan, that struck the Bay Bridge tower in 2007, seen sailing back into San Francisco Bay.
A large section of the ship was damaged when it came in contact the bridge tower leaving a scar on the hull about 150 feet long.
Workers with NRC Environmental Services sift through oil-soaked sand on Rodeo Beach November 12, 2007 near Muir Beach, California.
However, the ship’s hull tore open in the allision, spilling over 53,000 gallons of oil into the San Francisco Bay.
The spill required authorities to close 50 beaches all up and down the California coast, and nearly 7,000 birds died from the oil.
Investigators concluded that the boat’s captain was operating it under the influence of prescription drugs that impaired his ability to use navigation equipment.
He was sentenced to 10 months behind bars.
Damage to the fender cost $1.5 million to repair, but the bridge was unharmed. After being repaired, the ship set sail again on December 21, 2007.
‘The fenders did their job in that case,’ John Goodwin with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission told ABC. ‘So there was no damage to the bridge itself. That said, there was heavy damage to the fenders, not to mention to Cosco Busan and to the Bay.’
San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge: Near miss 2013
The Overseas Reymar sails under the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California, on January 11, 2013. The 752-foot vessel was cleared to sail by the Coast Guard after it collided with a Bay Bridge tower in fog.
Caltrans officials surveyed the the Bay Bridge that was damaged when the cargo ship Overseas Reymar slammed into the suspension structure a few weeks ago
Once again in 2013, though, an oil tanker struck the Bay Bridge.
On January 7, the 752-foot-long Overseas Reymar hit a tower in the middle of the bridge, damaging a portion of the fender around the bottom of the support structure.
In that case, the tanker was fortunately empty and heading out to sea, so the only oil onboard was for the engines – not cargo.
There were no injuries, and the ship was not substantially damaged.
The pier fender did require $1.4 million in repairs, though, according to a National Transportation Safety Board report.
In this week’s tragedy, the Singapore-flagged cargo ship Dali lost power multiple times before the crash, according to reports, and losing power means losing the ability to steer the ship, Bilal Ayyub, former chair of the American Society of Civil Engineers’ Infrastructure Resilience Division, told DailyMail.com.
Lives were almost certainly saved when the ship’s crew sent out a mayday call after losing power, giving authorities the chance to block most traffic from the bridge.
Even so, six men are missing and presumed dead from the collapse.
The ship involved in the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge is 948-foot-long Dali, a Singaporean-flagged container ship.
Each bridge is different, even those that are technically the same type.
Depending on the type of bridge and the width and depth of the body of water it is crossing, it will need different numbers of piers and slightly different protection systems.
But the idea behind them remains the same: Block the piers from being hit.
That being said, civil engineering experts told DailyMail.com that it’s entirely possible the bridge could have been destroyed even with protective devices, especially if they weren’t built with modern, high-bowed cargo ships in mind.
In response, transportation authorities are taking notes and refitting some major bridges with protective structures, despite it being a costly process.
The Delaware Memorial Bridge is currently undergoing a $95 million project to build protection cells around its piers, a project that began in July and is projected to be completed by September 2025.
