Strangely, it seems like the piers/columns had no protection. So this was bound to happen eventually.
This is almost exactly what happened to the Sunshine Skyway Bridge in 1980.
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I remember the Skyway bridge collapse.
Why on earth they didn’t have barriers for the FSK bridge is beyond me.
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One from a series of tastefully done documentaries.
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The Sunshine Skyway Bridge was always kind of a weirdly monumental thing that didn’t seem like it should be there. There are miles of causeway on either side, then a very long bridge with a big curve and that steep climb in a state where nearly all other roads are super flat (aside from highway overpasses).
My dad had dreams about that bridge specifically, well before the accident, and had started to plan a novel about it. I had more generic dreams for years about causeways that dipped underwater and had steep hills and jumps and impossible physics.
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Looking at Google Earth, there are power line pylons running parallel to the bridge. The pylons have protective walls around them, but the bridge piers do not.
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From: Baltimore bridge collapse: A bridge engineer explains what happened, and what needs to change
And indeed, there were two layers of protection: a so-called “dolphin” structure made from concrete, and a fender. The dolphins are in the water about 100 meters upstream and downstream of the piers. They are intended to be sacrificed in the event of a wayward ship, absorbing its energy and being deformed in the process but keeping the ship from hitting the bridge itself.
The fender is the last layer of protection. It is a structure made of timber and reinforced concrete placed around the main piers. Again, it is intended to absorb the energy of any impact.
Fenders are not intended to absorb impacts from very large vessels. And so when the MV Dali, weighing more than 100,000 tons, made it past the protective dolphins, it was simply far too massive for the fender to withstand.
Video recordings show a cloud of dust appearing just before the bridge collapsed, which may well have been the fender disintegrating as it was crushed by the ship.
The ship also came in at the pylon sideways rather than straight on, causing it to bypass the dolphins. And the size of the ship would have limited their effect.
(image shamelessly stolen from an Ars Technica comment)
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Thanks for the explanation.
I just read this on NPR:
Those onboard [the ship] issued a mayday, said Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, which gave authorities time to stop the flow of traffic on the bridge.
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I saw those little things. Somehow I don’t think it was quite enough.
One again, I will reference the Sunshine Skyway Bridge.
They have multiple dolphins surrounding all the smaller columns, along with a deep pile of rubble protecting main columns.
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Well, fuck… yet more fuel for conspiracy idiots theorists.
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Despicable. They should not have delayed reporting, and the FDA should have shut them down.
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Okay, do you folks think it’s against a mom’s better interests, as well as her children’s, to support RFK, Jr.
Not a close friend, but someone I kind of admired and respected…I mean, IMNSHO, he’s as bad as number 45.
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He’s an antivaxxer. I don’t think it’s in anyone’s best interests to vote for the schmuck.
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Exactly, but especially people with children oughtn’t to vote for him.
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Maybe this is why someone keeps trying to open credit cards in my name. I’m definitely in that leak.
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I use Google Voice as my main number. I use it with a SIM card from keepgo.com that I have in an unlocked phone. I usually keep my phone on Wi-Fi to preserve my data. I also will use Google Voice to make calls from my laptop.
I still need Wi-Fi but it saves a lot on phone service.
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