The unified command tasked with responding to the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore said March 29 that it has begun an engineering assessment for efforts to move the container ship Dali and the bridge debris. But officials warned that progress may be slow as the Patapsco River and the Port of Baltimore remain closed to sea traffic.
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore told reporters that the U.S. Navy is supplying four heavy-lift cranes for the effort. Two were already on the scene, and a third was scheduled to arrive that night. The last heavy lift is scheduled for Monday. Officials expect a total of seven floating cranes, 10 tugboats, nine barges and five Coast Guard vessels involved in the work.
One of the crane barges already on site, the Chesapeake 1000 owned by Donjon Marine Co. Inc. of Hillside, NJ, has a lifting capacity of 1,000 tons. But officials believe the part of the bridge resting on the Dali weighs three to four times as much, so it will need to be cut into smaller pieces, Moore said.
“To see this up close, you realize what a daunting task it is,” Moore said. “You realize the difficult work ahead of us.”
It will be some time before the unified command can clear the remains of the fallen bridge. The engineering assessment includes debris both above and below the waterline, Rear Adm. Shannon Gilreath, commander of the Coast Guard’s 5th District, said during a news conference. He said the unified command includes engineers from the US Army Corps of Engineers, Navy Salvage Supervisor, state, private companies and the US Coast Guard. The engineering firms involved include Resolve Marine, Donjon-Smit and Skanska, a spokesman for the unified command told ENR.
“Everybody is working diligently to figure out this plan so we can break this bridge down into the right size pieces that we can put up,” Gilreath said.
The process will involve repeated surveys and reassessments to ensure stability, said Col. Estee Pinchasin, commander of the US Army Baltimore District Corps of Engineers, during a news conference. He said it’s a methodical process that may seem slow to onlookers, but will ultimately speed up efforts to clean up the channel and reopen the harbor. It is too early to provide a timetable for the work, he added.
“By investing that time now in engineering, we’ll be able to move faster,” Pinchasin said.
Many of the people who worked on this effort were also part of the team that refloated the container ship never given in 2022 after it ran aground in the Chesapeake Bay shallows, Pinchasin said.
“That muscle memory of the industry, that incredible wealth of knowledge, experience, skills, experience, all those lessons are being applied here,” he said.
Once the debris is cleared, officials also plan to build a replacement bridge. The US Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration announced on March 28 that it made $60 million in emergency quick-release funds available for reconstruction. U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said the agency will continue to provide additional resources to support rebuilding.
Meanwhile, Moore said Tradepoint Atlantic, a multimodal marine terminal located downriver from the old bridge, has been able to accept some of the cargo that had been headed to the Port of Baltimore.
Four construction workers who had been on the bridge when the Dali collided with it early on March 26 are still missing and presumed dead. The bodies of two more workers have been recovered. Moore said finding the rest remains a priority, although conditions in the river have hampered divers’ ability to search the area.
