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As someone who steers similar ships and who has some knowledge about ship navigation in inland waterways I can say it's most likely mechanical error leading to an inability to navigate. It's possible it's user error but a ship in any inland waterway has a "pilot" on watch on the "bridge" who's either a permanent crew member or more than likely in this case, is a member of the pilots association and is a "local" who by the nature of their job is very familiar with that specific waterway.
International, "deep sea" vessels have a pilot, a captain, a mate, and multiple "watchmen/ab's" on watch in the pilot house observing and acting to make sure the ship navigates safely, not to mention multiple crew members monitoring systems from below the decks in the "engine control room"...
This is really dark...
*Edit: they were going 8kts when they hit the bridge, and apparently had an explosion on board which cut their power twice. Without power a ship can't steer. These ships also have crew standing by the anchors for emergencies but anchors don't work when moving that fast...
This is a solid post. No power, no propulsion on a ship that size in a narrow channel?
Is this a major bridge in the area of a secondary bridge?
It's obviously a tragedy for all the lives lost but I'm wondering how badly it's gonna interrupt life in the area for the next few years, will it be a minor inconvenience not to have that route available or is it gonna cause a complete disruption of lives and traffic nightmares everywhere
Our city of similar size to Baltimore and we have two spans. The one in the background is for buses and passenger vehicles only and leads to the Atlantic. The one in the foreground allows for commercial and high-sided vehicles and precedes the Bedford Basin. Losing either bridge would make an an already challenging commute during rush hours to a fucking nightmare. The highway/roadway system to bypass the bridges would not be able to handle the added traffic from losing one of our bridges.
I would think you would be looking a couple years' work at best to replace, even on short notice/emergency. Those who can work or do school from home might as well start calling it in.
Nah, that's one of if not my biggest fear, falling off a bridge
When I took my ex and her son to the Golden Gate Bridge they wanted to walk across it. I said go ahead, I'm going to wait at the visitors parking, fuck that
Yea, I been terrified of that since I was a kid, everytime I go over the Bay Bridge I get little flashes in my mind of the bridge failing and our car tumbling head first to our icy death
Thais will help with that, Im sure...
In the pic that I posted, the bridge in the background was getting re-decked about 10 years back now. Underneath the bridge was the old copper plant from MT&T days linking Halifax and Dartmouth. Before the re-decking could start, I had to pull two heavy fibre cables (about 4" in diameter) underneath the bridge in the foreground to tie in to the fiber plant to absorb the switching load (not allowed to install residential telephone on copper anymore here) that would be lost during the re-decking process. It took a crew of 7 of us almost 3 weeks to do it (we weren't lucky enough for the pathway to be a straight fucking line).
Those suspension bridges have quite a lot of flex and sway to them in high winds. It was intimidating at times. They say it's like hitting concrete at those heights. Didn't much feel like testing out that theory.