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Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 12:35 pm Post subject: Baltimore Bridge Collapse
Hello SEFIans,
Just a few hours ago a bridge in Baltimore, USA collapsed when a big ship collided into one of its supporting piers. Many casualties are feared. The bridge had opened in 1977 to traffic. Notice, the sudden, almost instantaneous collapse exposing the lightness and flimsiness of the trussed arch bridge, captured on camera.
This will in all likelihood initiate a debate on safety of bridges and the inherent progressive collapse such accidents can cause due to lack of redundancy in most bridges.
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 1:30 pm Post subject: Blatimore Bridge Collapse
Dear Alpa
Thanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
· Winner of “IEI Industry Excellence Award 2022â€
· CEAI National Award winner for “Excellence in Engineering Consultancy Services†for 2017, 2018 & 2023
On Tue, Mar 26, 2024 at 6:07 PM alpa_sheth <forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org)> wrote:
Quote:
Hello SEFIans,
Just a few hours ago a bridge in Baltimore, USA collapsed when a big ship collided into one of its supporting piers. Many casualties are feared. The bridge had opened in 1977 to traffic. Notice, the sudden, almost instantaneous collapse exposing the lightness and flimsiness of the trussed arch bridge, captured on camera.
This will in all likelihood initiate a debate on safety of bridges and the inherent progressive collapse such accidents can cause due to lack of redundancy in most bridges.
This collapse will evoke interest both as engineers and being Indian, notable is the fact that the entire crew is reportedly Indian. Bridge engineers may please throw light on possible learnings from such failures and ways to protect bridges. Seniors such as Er Alok Bhowmick and many other bridge engineers in the forum may like to comment.
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 5:30 pm Post subject: Blatimore Bridge Collapse
I am in agreement with Alpa Sheth. If the piers were made of Concrete, the caison like piers would have borne the impact load from the ship colliding and no local failure of "lattices" would have occurred leading to collapse. The deflection of the latticed pier must also been too much hence the collapse.
On Tue, 26 Mar, 2024, 10:04 PM bsec, <forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org)> wrote:
[quote] Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 5:38 pm Post subject: Blatimore Bridge Collapse
Dear all,
I didn’t see any tugboats towing the ship in the videos shared. Is it normal for such ship to go on its own power in such narrow corridors?
Prakash RaoSent from my iPhone
[quote]On 26 Mar 2024, at 10:06 PM, bsec <forum@sefindia.org> wrote:
 Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 6:30 pm Post subject: Baltimore Bridge Collapse
All crew members of the container ship were Indians
Regards
Rudra Nevatia
On Tue, 26 Mar, 2024, 11:10 pm sudhirbadami, <forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org)> wrote:
Quote:
I am in agreement with Alpa Sheth. If the piers were made of Concrete, the caison like piers would have borne the impact load from the ship colliding and no local failure of "lattices" would have occurred leading to collapse. The deflection of the latticed pier must also been too much hence the collapse.
Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 6:53 pm Post subject: Baltimore Bridge Collapse
In my previous project at Bangladesh I have seen construction of fender piles and pile caps seperately constructed at upstream and downstream of the river to protect the piers from à ny collision with ships. If it can be implemented in Bangladesh, I wish to know if there was any such provision or not?
On Tue, Mar 26, 2024, 11:14 PM sudhirbadami <forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org)> wrote:
Quote:
I am in agreement with Alpa Sheth. If the piers were made of Concrete, the caison like piers would have borne the impact load from the ship colliding and no local failure of "lattices" would have occurred leading to collapse. The deflection of the latticed pier must also been too much hence the collapse.
On Tue, 26 Mar, 2024, 10:04 PM bsec, forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org))> wrote:
Quote:
Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Posted: Tue Mar 26, 2024 7:30 pm Post subject: Baltimore Bridge Collapse
Dear friends, Fallowing reasons arrived at experts on prima-facie studies.
1. The ship was expected to move right at the middle region of the span.
2. The pier was not designed for the impact of ship.
3. There was power failure when it was at sufficient distance from the bridge & even after restoration of power, it went off & on. So the momentum with which it was moving could not be brought back to proper direction a short distance so that it could safely move under the center of the span.
4. Due to the cargo weight & weight of ship , the momentum will be very high & consequent force is large enough to destabilize the bridge pier .
On Tue, 26 Mar 2024, 23:13 sudhirbadami, <forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org)> wrote:
Quote:
I am in agreement with Alpa Sheth. If the piers were made of Concrete, the caison like piers would have borne the impact load from the ship colliding and no local failure of "lattices" would have occurred leading to collapse. The deflection of the latticed pier must also been too much hence the collapse.
On Tue, 26 Mar, 2024, 10:04 PM bsec, forum@sefindia.org (forum@sefindia.org))> wrote:
Quote:
Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Posted: Wed Mar 27, 2024 3:30 am Post subject: Baltimore Bridge Collapse
These days effect of ship collision on foundations of bridges on waterways is investigated as part of design procedure
Eg it was done for Stonecutters bridge in Hongkong
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I am in agreement with Alpa Sheth. If the piers were made of Concrete, the caison like piers would have borne the impact load from the ship colliding and no local failure of "lattices" would have occurred leading to collapse. The deflection of the latticed pier must also been too much hence the collapse.
Dear AlpaThanks for your post.
The spectacular failure video of Baltimore Bridge due to ship collision is a treasure for bridge engineers, though extremely unfortunate. We have seen such a spectacular collapse video in one of the Indian bridges (under construction) last year. I am sure this collapses will lead to National Transport Safety Board (NTSB) coming forward to constitute an expert committee to go into the root cause and the outcome will lead to changes in regulation in operation of water transport as well as changes in AASHTO codes and standards.
I wish in India we could have an independent body like NTSB to address the failures in India. They are more frequent than in the USA and our forensic investigations are cosmetic, to say the least.
By the way your observation about lightness of superstructure as reason for failure is not appropriate in my view. The problem in all probability is with the (lack of) protection of substructure for ship collision, and oversight from the authority in regulation of ship movement, which has possibly led to this disaster.
I look forward to getting more details on this failure
Best Wishes
Alok Bhowmick
Collapse of aesthetic steel bridge hit by cargo ship is very sad news .
Experts here in sefi have given their observations on collapse and suggestions , so that such happenings be avoided in future.
I think, depending on max length of any ship crossing bridge underneath , it is very important to provide upstream ( especially) and down stream channelisation of ship path through such heavy impact absorbing devices (on piles) which can absorb initial impact . It will add to cost but some provisions need to made for protections.
Further piers ( Rcc or Steel) must be protected by Rcc shield wall on piles,for shallow height , not interfering with aesthetics.
Not easy since ship impact force could be alarming ,, and cost effective protection needed,, looking to very meagre probability of such instances.
Also ship driving manuals need more precautions while approaching bridge in form of speed and tidal waves effect.
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