Maritime Accidents and the Francis Scott Key Bridge

There is no indication that the Francis Scott Key bridge collapse was caused by an intentional act of terrorism.  However, as someone who has done a couple of hundred marine accident investigations, nothing can be ruled out at this point.  Probability is not certainty – and assume is often broken down into “ass-u-me” for good reason.  

After watching the video of the slow motion crash, only one thing can be stated with any certainty and that is the loss of ship’s power.  This loss cascaded into loss of directional control and the impact on one of the key bridge support structures followed.  

The first critical aspect of this investigation is data collection.  From environmental conditions to control settings to crew interviews to fuel issues would seem to be among the first steps at a minimum.  Maintenance, overhaul and construction records must be searched as well as any indicators of prior failure regardless of how small.  Literally, ever ship that has this particular power and control configuration will have to be checked as well.  At some point, there will have to be an accident reconstruction to see if the conditions for failure can be duplicated.  (Trying to make all of this fit into some coherent picture is going to be a complex and long term venture.  An answer may be found but certainty is not guaranteed.)

And then there is the ghost in the machine.  Something so rare or unusual that  no design can account for it and no explanation works.  I have experience with the ghost in the machine and it is frustrating.  Here are a couple of examples:

The new class of ferryboats was praised for their luxurious accommodations and modern power plant.  The class was truly an upgrade in every sense; however, it had the unfortunate and irregular habit of losing power as it approached the dock.  As one might expect, all kinds of tests were performed and maintenance was done and redone – but the lack of  reliability of the power plant continued.  Quite ghost like don’t you think?

Then there was an item of ship installed ground support test equipment.  The ship’s crew would use it according to their training and instructions, but it just didn’t work reliably.  It was sent to the operational level for maintenance and then to the highest depot level maintenance.  In each case, the test equipment was found to work according to specification and was put back in use.  Yet, in each case, it didn’t work with any level of reliability when in the hands of a ship’s crew.  The ghost in the machine won the battle.

Now back to the crash that caused the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge.  Unless something is found relatively quickly, this complex investigation can easily drag on for a year or more.

While I believe that this is one of those unfortunate accidents and not terrorism, I am still left with the fact that probability is not certainty.  And then there is that damnable ghost in the machine.