Bridge over Mississippi River collapses
 

I can't believe nobody else has posted this yet, not sure if all of you have heard or not, but there is an apparent 9 dead I belive, around 60 injured and 20 missing last I heard.



Stolen from: www.cnn.com


MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota (CNN) -- Dozens of relatives waited for word of their loved ones Thursday as authorities tried to recover bodies lodged in the wreckage of a Minneapolis bridge.


Vehicles are scattered along the broken remains of the Interstate 35W bridge.

1 of 2 more photos » As many as 50 vehicles are trapped in the rubble or in the river after the eight-lane interstate bridge collapsed during Minneapolis' evening rush hour Wednesday. Twenty to 30 people were missing, Minneapolis police Chief Tim Dolan said.

"We know of several people who were pinned or trapped" that have died, he said.

"There's an individual case where an individual was severely injured and was talking to a medical personnel and was able to say his goodbyes to his family [before] he passed on," Dolan told a news conference.

Four people were confirmed dead, and officials said at least 79 people were injured when the Interstate 35W bridge over the Mississippi River collapsed. Watch bridge fall in four seconds »

Jessica Engebretsen, waiting near the collapsed bridge for news of her mother, asked people to pray for the missing.

Her sister, Anne, struggled to hold back the tears as she described her mom, Sherry Engebretsen, as "a fighter."

Other relatives of the missing gathered at a hotel to await word from officials.

The water below the collapsed bridge is about 7 to 8 feet deep -- just covering the roofs of the dozens of cars that are in the water, Dolan said.

The bridge fell 60 feet, about six stories, into the river. See a diagram of the bridge »

"This is going to take a long time, this recovery," Dolan said.

Hennepin County Sheriff Richard Stanek said conditions in the Mississippi River were treacherous, as the twisted steel and blocks of pavement were pushed around by river currents. He said the search could go on for five days or longer.

The Hennepin County medical examiner on Thursday morning said the confirmed death toll was four, lower than the seven to nine deaths reported earlier. Watch driver describe skidding cars

President Bush on Thursday pledged federal aid to rebuild the bridge. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters said $5 million was being made available immediately to pay for traffic flow adjustments and debris removal.

Investigators will try to reassemble the bridge to determine what caused the collapse, said Mark Rosenker, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.

Security camera video showed the Interstate 35W bridge's center section collapsing into the river in less than four seconds. The northern end of the span appeared to drop first and the southern end followed. Witnesses describe the chaotic scene »

CNN obtained the video from a source who asked to remain unidentified because they were not authorized to distribute it publicly.

Gary Babineau was driving his truck across the bridge as it fell.

"I could see the whole bridge as it was going down and as I was falling, and it just gave a rumble real quick, and it all just gave way, and it just fell completely all the way to the ground," Babineau said. See photos of the disaster »

"This particular section or freeway was under repair," Minneapolis fire Chief Jim Clack said. "We don't know yet what caused the collapse. We do not believe at this point there was any terrorism or nefarious activity -- it was just a structural collapse."

A federal investigative team has been dispatched to the scene.

A school bus filled with more than 50 children who were returning from a summer field trip was among the vehicles on the bridge when it collapsed.

Tony Wagner, the president of a local nonprofit social services group that organized the trip, said eight of the kids, ages 5 to 14, were hospitalized.

Mark Lacroix, who lives on the 20th floor of an apartment building near the bridge, told CNN he saw the last seconds of the collapse.

"I heard this massive rumbling and shaking ... and looked out my window," Lacroix said. "It just fell right into the river."

According to the Minneapolis Riverfront District Web site, the steel arch bridge was opened in 1967. Its longest span stretches 458 feet over the river, and it was constructed with no mid-river piers to facilitate river traffic.

The bridge was undergoing nonstructural re-decking work, U.S. Transportation Department spokesman Brian Turmail said.

A 2001 study conducted by the Minnesota Department of Transportation found "several fatigue problems" in the bridge's approach spans and "poor fatigue details" on the main truss.

The study suggested that the design of bridge's main truss could cause a collapse if one of two support planes were to become cracked, although it allowed that a collapse might not occur in that event. But, the study concluded, "fatigue cracking of the deck truss is not likely" and "replacement of the bridge ... may be deferred."

Two years ago, the U.S. Department of Transportation's National Bridge Inventory database said the bridge was "structurally deficient."

It's about time someone posted this up. I've been hearing about it since yesterday, and people calling me to 'see if I'm okay'. Luckily I didn't go to Minneapolis yesterday, but I was supposed to.

I had been surfing CNN at work, as usual right when it happened, the page refreshed and that was the bulliten on the top of the page, I ended up watching MSNBC last night for an hour or so while they had some live coverage out there, it's really sad. I really hope there are alot more people alive, but it doesn't look all that promising :(


Edit: What's bad about this story for me as well, and I'm assuming anyone else that watches the news, is that I drive over 2 large bridges and a couple small ones on my way to and from work, there is no way around it, and they've been doing contruction on it for the past few days, now I need to go read up on the D.O.T.'s website and see what kind of grade they have and if I need to be concerned or not, though most of our bridges are in pretty good shape, that one over the Miss looked somewhat outdated and needed to be replaced anyways, though.

There was a school bus with 60 kids on it on the bridge. That's gotta suck.

I doubt they will be finding too many more alive but lets hope they dont find any more dead. It will be interesting to see what caused this, hopefully it wasn't some dumbass engineering decision like that hotel that had a causeway collapse from the 4th floor into the lobby and killed a lot of people because of a very bad design.

From what I could tell last night, only two kids we're slightly injured, both girls had small 'lacerations' but they should be okay, most of them we're just scared shitless, and I don't blame them one bit, i'd be scared shitless right along with them.

Damn, and another story, I was watching the news last night, and apparently this guy in a Ford Explorer was driving along, and told reporters that he knew what was happeneing when it occured, then as the bridge stood straight up while he was driving on it, apparently his SUV just rolled backwards and leveled out with the ground, and right after the bridge fell apart, and he proceeded to just hop out and go help people out, just amazing.

Yeah, we'll just hope everyone disappeared.

According to what I watched earlier today the bridge had gotten a 50 on its last inspection in...'05 I believe, that's out of a 120 max, so needless to say, someone was being a cheapass and wouldn't repair it. So it was pretty much a dumbass decision.

I'm surprised they wouldn't use Food Stamp funds to re-enforce it.

I doubt they find any more survivors. It happened last night, they've been searching all day today. Most people that got trapped probably drowned.

Have you seen the video? You can see cars plummeting at an alarming rate. How tragic.

Nah, I've only seen the video of the aftermath, it's pretty sad :(.

Fucking architects...and cheap contractors. lol.

It does suck, i saw a pic of a mom and her little baby about ours' age. :(. I hate when i see things like that...and this...

well it looks like her page is private now...but go onto myspace and lookup "kalebs story"...its about a baby boy who got shaken baby syndrome from a babysitter while mom started back to work. I cried for like an hour and called my parents like 5 times the day i came across it :(.

Whats shaken baby syndrome?

It's when you put a baby in a bag of shake-n-bake and cook them up, it's a very tasty disorder.

Shaking baby syndrome is when your kid won't quit crying, so you shake them until they stop, it usually rattles their brain or something and eventually gives them parkinsons? Not sure, but I know you can do it to dogs as well, usually smaller ones that're yappity.

I absolutely loathe dogs like that. Fuckin small ass dogs that can't stfu. GET A LIFE, NOOBS.

SBS is when an adult shakes a baby...it causes ALL KINDS of internal problems

with this little boy...
he had a stroke
his brain swelled wth blood
he nearly died. they put a tube into his head to drain the fluids, he had 15+ surgeries. He will be blind and in a vegetable state for the rest of his life.He has a tube in his stomach to feed him. He is a week younger than our daugther.

Yeah no joke, I'm glad they made this little invention called duct tape, works great, and it's entertaining to watch them try and pull it off, fuck muzzles.

Or just use a rolled up newspaper, but if you enjoy duct taping your dog to each his own.

Twins home game was post-poned.