The Baltimore drama: prayers in Spanish, a billion-dollar compensation and toxic containers at sea

Two key chapters of the procedure in Baltimore will be compensation to the families of the deceased workers and the serious economic consequences that the paralysis of the port is already beginning to generate. The third lies, evidently, in the costs of rebuilding the bridge, which is insured by the State. In fact, the federal government has announced that, without waiting for lawsuits, it will now assume the “necessary” investments to rebuild “as soon as possible” a vital communication route in Maryland.

A fourth factor that will influence the process will be the characteristics of the incident itself; whether it has been due to negligence or, as everything seems to indicate, a breakdown. According to economic media, the ‘Dali’ operator has a contract with a global insurance consortium that would allow it a coverage ceiling of 3,000 million dollars. As an anecdote, legal experts do not rule out that the company resorts to a law from 1851, enacted precisely to mitigate payments to the giants of the sea in colossal accidents to avoid their ruin. The owners of the ‘Titanic’ already used it in 1912.

The blockage of the docks due to the enormous amount of debris blocking the exit from the Chesapeake Bay has become a major challenge for Maryland authorities. “No one can remember the last time the port was forced to close completely,” Senate President Bill Ferguson stressed this Thursday. Most of the 15,000 workers at the terminal are forced to temporarily close their companies and workshops until maritime traffic resumes. The impact is monumental. Two million dollars in salaries are paid at the port every day. The employees “are scared. They just don’t know what the future will be like,” Ferguson says.

State legislators are urgently processing legislation, called the Port Law, to provide economic coverage to workers and finance companies during the time they remain closed so that they retain their workforce. The goal is for this legislation to come into force before April 8. “Until we can clear the debris and open the canal again, there will be no work for them.” acknowledges Democratic Congressman Kweisi Mfume, who says that the port loses 15 million in income for every day it remains immobile.

Very cloudy waters

Precisely because of this urgency, and after a meeting with the emergency services this past morning, the authorities have decided to slow down the search for the bodies of the four victims whose whereabouts are unknown to give priority to the removal of the remains from the viaduct. “We have to focus on rebuilding the bridge,” declared the president of the Maryland Senate.

It is also true, as recognized by Maryland Police Superintendent Roland L. Butler, that the conditions for tracking bodies have become exceptionally complicated. The waters are so cloudy that divers can barely see beyond their arms. After rescuing two bodies inside a van, emergency services believe that the other four missing could be found inside the truck and the other three cars that remain in the river. The problem is that the vehicles are trapped inside the sunken remains of the bridge superstructure, which increases the risks and makes access difficult.

The deceased are all Latin Americans. Baltimore remembered them this Thursday through a ceremony at the historic Patterson Botanical Garden. Those gathered have sung and prayed in Spanish. A leader of the Hispanic community has indicated that his death has caused a “powerful emotional impact” on the Latin American community in the city, which has criticized the “very harsh” working conditions suffered by immigrants, despite being a key workforce. in sectors such as food, construction and services.

All operations on the Patapsco River seem to become more complicated as the hours pass and even the smallest details of the catastrophe are revealed. The ‘Dali’ remains anchored and motionless under the remains of the viaduct. When it collided with its base in the early hours of Tuesday, the upper part of the deck rotated on itself and collapsed on the bow of the merchant ship, which has been trapped under hundreds of tons of metal and is suffering serious damage.

The Singapore-flagged ship was carrying 4,700 containers and its final destination was Sri Lanka. She planned to encircle South Africa to avoid Houthi rebels in the Red Sea. What worries US authorities most now is that more than fifty containers opened and some fell into the sea. Some contained hazardous materials, the National Transportation Safety Board has found. The ‘Dali’ had 764 tons of corrosive and flammable substances on board. Jennifer Homendy, president of the Board, has assured that “we have seen brilliance in the waterway” and highlighted that the container ship “is devastated.”

“A ship is approaching without direction”

The existence of these materials will be added to the investigation that the authorities are carrying out on the origin of the accident. The ship’s captain, the first officer and the chief engineer have already been questioned and the agents will meet with the two pilots this Thursday. The 21 crew members remain on board, without authorization to go ashore while investigations continue, damages are assessed and maintenance is focused on. They have food for 27 days.

The recordings of the last six hours of activity at the ‘Dali’ are already being analyzed, although it is presumed that the investigations will last many days. The rigor of this process requires reviewing at least the last full month of data records to find out if the merchant had any type of breakdown or suffered other blackouts such as the one that led to the attack on the viaduct.

The conversations recorded during the last five minutes before the collision reveal, for now, a chain of fatal coincidences, technical failures and situations of great nervousness due to the inevitable nature of the crash. It is known that at 1:25 a.m., the tugs broke free from the container ship, the ship began to accelerate and, suddenly, “numerous audible alarms” sounded, the report cites.

The engines then stopped working and a “total blackout” occurred. The pilot on board noticed that the ship was beginning to drift to the right. He ordered the propulsion system to restart and turn left. In the video of the incident, a large black smoke can be seen. It is the moment in which the pilots activate the auxiliary generator, but it is of no use because the ‘Dali’ is already a 95,000-ton missile.

The tugboats, notified by the pilot himself, began the return maneuver to try to take control of the ship, but there was no time. Ultimately, the pilot ordered the port anchor to be dropped. Nothing helped.

Meanwhile, transport authorities managed to stop traffic on the bridge ‘in extremis’. A recording from the department to the Police allows us to hear: “I need one of you on the south side, one of you on the north side, to stop all traffic on Key Bridge. A ship is approaching that has just lost its way. A few moments later another alarmed voice shouts “There’s a team up there.” He refers to the maintenance workers, but then the bridge bends from the impact and falls into pieces into the water.

Experts estimate that the accident will now force maritime traffic on the east coast to be rescheduled, both for cargo and passenger ships, while the port channel is freed. And furthermore, it is possible that it will force us to rethink security measures on bridges and ports in the face of the proliferation of ocean giants like the ‘Dali’. “When one hundred thousand tons end up at the same point at the same time, nothing can support it,” explained the Secretary of State for Transport, Peter Buttigieg.

In fact, the same pillar of the Francis Scott Key that the ‘Dali’ collided with was already hit in 1980 by another freighter. the ‘Blue Nagoya’, in an accident that only caused damage to the reinforced concrete of the base. The ‘Blue Nagoya’ had a significantly smaller wingspan, but has many similarities with the accident that occurred on Tuesday. She was sailing at a speed similar to that of the ‘Dali’ and also stopped missteering one kilometer from the viaduct.