New Post: Baltimore begins race to clean up Key Bridge collapse, reopen port -Huge crane ships, thousands of relief workers and millions of dollars headed toward Baltimore on Thursday, as efforts turned from recovery after the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge to a massive cleanup that some experts described as unprecedented and highly dangerous. The U.S. Navy deployed several floating cranes, including one that could lift...
Huge crane ships, thousands of relief workers and millions of dollars headed toward Baltimore on Thursday, as efforts turned from recovery after the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge to a massive cleanup that some experts described as unprecedented and highly dangerous.The U.S. Navy deployed several floating cranes, including one that could lift 1,000 tons, while the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said it would send more than 1,100 engineering specialists and other experts to begin removing the hulking debris that has crippled the Port of Baltimore.Federal officials also announced the first relief funds — $60 million sought by Maryland officials — would flow toward disaster recovery just hours after the request was submitted.Top officials with the Corps, which is leading the effort to clear the Patapsco River, described a three step effort to get one of the nation’s largest shipping hubs back online. They are racing to stem the rippling economic fallout from a cargo ship striking the bridge on Tuesday.Teams would first try to clear the shipping channel of the massive steel trusses that block it to allow one-way traffic to begin flowing again into and out of the port. Second, they would lift pieces of the bridge draped across the 985-foot Dali and move it. Finally, they would dredge up concrete and steel that have settled on the river bed.Officials have yet to offer a timeline for how long that process will take, but infrastructure and salvage experts said the cleanup would pose a monumental challenge that includes frigid waters for divers having to cut steal beams and the 764 tons of hazardous materials that remain onboard the Dali.Peter Ford, founder of SkyRock Advisors which provides consulting on infrastructure projects and is a former Merchant Marine, compared the operation to freeing a container ship that became stuck in the Suez Canal in 2021, but perhaps more complex.“This will be highly technical, very difficult and frankly dangerous,” Ford said. “This size of vessel. This size of bridge. All of the span coming down entirely and some of it still on top of a vessel is a situation that I have never read about in my career.”U.S. Coast Guard Rear Adm. Shannon Gilreath laid out a three-step plan on Mar. 28 to reopen the port of Baltimore after the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse. (Video: The Washington Post)Federal officials have not described in detail how they plan to carry out the clean up mission, but Ford said he thought they would begin by using sonar and other tools to map out where