BALTIMORE (NEWSnet/AP) — Crews opened a second temporary channel on Tuesday allowing a limited amount of marine traffic to bypass the wreckage of Baltimore’s collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge.
Work is ongoing to open a third channel that will allow larger vessels to pass through the bottleneck, officials announced at a news conference Tuesday afternoon. The channels are primarily open primarily to vessels that are helping with the cleanup effort, along with some barges and tugs that have been stuck in the Port of Baltimore.
A tugboat pushing a fuel barge was the first vessel to use an alternate channel late Monday. It was supplying jet fuel to Delaware’s Dover Air Force Base.
Gov. Wes Moore said rough weather conditions over the last two days, including thunderstorms, have made it unsafe for divers trying to recover the bodies of the four construction workers who are believed trapped underwater in the wreckage.
U.S Army Corps of Engineers Col. Estee Pinchasin said the underwater conditions are “extremely unforgiving” for divers.
Crews are undertaking the complicated work of removing steel and concrete at the site of the bridge’s deadly collapse after a container ship lost power and crashed into a supporting column on March 26. The ship issued a mayday alert, which allowed just enough time for police to stop traffic, but not enough to save a roadwork crew filling potholes on the bridge.
Authorities believe six members of a road construction crew plunged to their deaths in the collapse, including two whose bodies were recovered last week. Two other workers survived.
President Joe Biden is expected to visit the collapse site Friday to meet with state and local officials.
Follow NEWSnet on Facebook and X platform to get our headlines in your social feeds.
Copyright 2024 NEWSnet and The Associated Press. All rights reserved.