WTOP Part of Key Bridge in Baltimore collapses after large boat collision, sending vehicles into water

[TheGreatBuzz]

 

 

 

[zCommander]

It took Google a whole week+ to realize the bridge is no longer there? It should have been done in mere hours instead. 

[SkinsFTW]

8 hours ago, zCommander said:

It took Google a whole week+ to realize the bridge is no longer there? It should have been done in mere hours instead. 

 

https://www.npr.org/2019/06/27/736572732/google-maps-leads-about-100-drivers-into-a-muddy-mess-in-colorado

[balki1867]

13 hours ago, zCommander said:

It took Google a whole week+ to realize the bridge is no longer there? It should have been done in mere hours instead. 

i used to work for a competitor to Google maps and it turns out that outside of the technical reasons for a lag in officially removing a segment of road (e.g.: replication across multiple clouds, internal processes to make sure major segments of road don’t get removed haphazardly), people also get really emotional about maps.
 

We literally dealt with riots because of how disputed international borders were drawn, or how a controversial road was named.
 

It seems silly but it would’ve looked really insensitive to just remove the Key bridge from the map while Baltimore was still dealing with the crisis. Marking the road as closed for a few days instead achieves the same result.

 

[TheGreatBuzz]

On 3/26/2024 at 8:17 AM, TheGreatBuzz said:

Way-too-early prediction time.

 

The ship suffered a 'main bus one' casualty. That's essentially the circuit board for the entire ship. Either a fire that caused a malfunction or vice versa. You see power kick back on and the plum of smoke. That's the ship kicking over to 'main bus two', essentially the backup electric system and everything kicking back on. The fire/casualty took out bus two which is where you see the power go out a second time. The ship is essentially dead at that point. 

 

This exact thing happened when I was on the Chancellorsville. Luckily we were in the middle of the Pacific ocean so there wasn't much to hit. But we just floated for a couple days. No power except emergency battery operated lights around the ship. We slept on the flight deck at night because it was so hot.

 

 

 

 

 

[Dan T.]

On 4/5/2024 at 6:04 AM, balki1867 said:

i used to work for a competitor to Google maps and

 

 

 

Off on a tangent, but Google Maps used to show a non-existent street right across from my house. The map showed it going right through my neighbors' yards to the next street over.  It was a big "WTF?" to me, then I learned that they did this in various places as a "gotcha" so as to catch competitors using their proprietary maps for their own use. 

[The Evil Genius]

8 minutes ago, Dan T. said:

 

 

Off on a tangent, but Google Maps used to show a non-existent street right across from my house. The map showed it going right through my neighbors' yards to the next street over.  It was a big "WTF?" to me, then I learned that they did this in various places as a "gotcha" so as to catch competitors using their proprietary maps for their own use. 

 

Seems like they'd be setting themselves up for a lawsuit though if someone followed the fake part of the map and drove across the lawn/in to the house.

[balki1867]

27 minutes ago, The Evil Genius said:

 

Seems like they'd be setting themselves up for a lawsuit though if someone followed the fake part of the map and drove across the lawn/in to the house.

 

This is actually small potatoes for the mapmaker.  One of my favorite stories was the complexities of rendering a map in Kashmir-- the disputed region between India and Pakistan.

 

Legally speaking-- they had to render a different map depending on whether a device was in India or Pakistan.  If you were in India, the map of India showed the India-Pakistan border as if Kashmir was completely part of India.  Likewise, if you were in Pakistan, it was rendered as if Kashmir was completely part of Pakistan.

 

More practically speaking, the region is split by a line of control and India and Pakistan each control a piece of Kashmir.  If you're on the Indian side of the LOC, you get the Indian version of the map, etc.

 

Now here's the really tricky part-- if you're trying to drive from one part of Kashmir to another, theoretically speaking, regardless of which country Kashmir belongs to, you should be able to drive between two points of the region.  In reality though, you might be crossing a military checkpoint between the two countries and it's not realistic to drive between those two points. So basically, they have to render one map based on one set of logic to appease political entities, while computing directions based on a completely different map that's based on reality.

 

Wash/rinse/repeat this in every disputed border in the world- Korea, Ukraine, Israel/Gaza/West Bank, China/Taiwan (luckily you can't drive this one :D), etc.

Edited April 10 by balki1867

[Dan T.]

17 hours ago, The Evil Genius said:

 

Seems like they'd be setting themselves up for a lawsuit though if someone followed the fake part of the map and drove across the lawn/in to the house.

I suppose. But it was a fake short street within a small neighborhood that no one would really need to use. And nothing looking like a street was there. 
 

Reading up on the practice of traps, mapmakers actually inserted a fake hamlet called Agloe in upstate New York as a trap. 

from Wiki:

—

In the 1920s, General Drafting founder Otto G. Lindberg and an assistant, Ernest Alpers, assigned an anagram of their initials to a dirt-road intersection in the Catskill Mountains: NY 206 and Morton Hill Road, north of Roscoe, New York.^[2] The town was designed as a "copyright trap" to enable the publishers to detect others copying their maps.

 

In the 1950s, a general store was built at the intersection on the map, and was given the name Agloe General Store because the name was on the Esso maps.^[3] Later, Agloe appeared on a Rand McNally map after the mapmaker got the name of the "hamlet" from the Delaware County administration. When Esso threatened to sue Rand McNally for the assumed copyright infringement which the "trap" had revealed, the latter pointed out that the place had now become real and therefore no infringement could be established.

—

Agloe, New York - Wikipedia

 

 

Edited April 11 by Dan T.

[tshile]

While we’re on the topic. Mapping systems had a road running through my property that doesn’t exist, that connected to a residential area that would be of value to those that lived there (if the road existed)

 

we built a house and that includes a driveway. My driveway is like 750 feet long so you can’t exactly tell where it leads when you first drive into it. 
 

this resulted in a bunch of people driving down my driveway only to find my house. People they lived in the neighborhood they through a new street and cut through now existed. People delivering food or packages that had GPS route them to the road that doesn’t actually exist. 
 

it took 6 months of filing complaints through google maps to get them to remove the road. 
 

Apple Maps still has it. 
 

At the start we were going to put a gate up but the issue has died down to the point where it’s not worth it anymore. It’s only really a problem at Christmas time when Amazon staffed up by hiring asshole drivers that throw stuff into the grass halfway down the driveway cause they suck. 

[Dan T.]

^^^ Well that sucks for you tshile.  Our situation wasn't disruptive in any way that I could tell.  I surmised they picked the spot precisely because it wouldn't cause any issues.  Clearly not the case for your situation.

 

 

 

Edited April 11 by Dan T.

[tshile]

It’s mostly died down minus the Amazon drivers at Christmas time. 
 

which, given the trending topics of young adults not understand how cash works and other weird wtf things, the notion that a person has a street address and somehow you can get to their house (by road) without ever first going to the street in the persons address is another sign of just how dumb the current crop of young adults are. 

Edited April 11 by tshile

[Cooked Crack]

 

[SkinsFTW]

Why the criminal investigation?

 

They probably were going over the speed limit though. Somebody might be getting a speeding ticket.

 

Wasn't it 8+ knots?

 

I know that in San Diego harbor the speed limt is 5mph. Which is I think about 4kts.

[zCommander]

5 hours ago, SkinsFTW said:

Why the criminal investigation?

 

They probably were going over the speed limit though. Somebody might be getting a speeding ticket.

 

Wasn't it 8+ knots?

 

I know that in San Diego harbor the speed limt is 5mph. Which is I think about 4kts.

 

People died. If the ship was not fit to be on water and they knew that and still pushed forward then that is negligence and probably involuntary manslaughter or something like that I would imagine. Speed had nothing to with it. 

[The 12th Commandment]

We had a whole series of lectures on Maps as propaganda (and how very effective they are) in one of my upper division geography classes.  The big Red Soviet Union most of us grew up with, who's giant size compared to the US when using Mercator projections is very scary, was a prime example.  

 

We also had an exercise where we tried to use words to describe a map, of only a small area, and you quickly see how dense the information on even a small map can be.

 

-geography nerd

[China]

Port of Baltimore opens third temporary channel for vessels following Key Bridge collapse

 

A third temporary channel in the Port of Baltimore opened late Friday, allowing more vessels and goods to flow into the crucial shipping center following the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in March.

 

The passageway was opened by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) as it continues to clear away the wreckage of the Dali, the container ship that collided with the bridge, as well as the twisting metal and chunks of concrete from the bridge itself. As The National Desk reported Friday, USACE, Coast Guard, and other responding crews have been able to remove around 120 containers from the wreck of the Dali, and hope to finally move the ship after taking away 140. 3,000 tons of bridge steel has also been removed from the port.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Ship that hit Baltimore bridge was 'unseaworthy' when it left port, city claims

 

The Dali, the container ship that left the Port of Baltimore in the early hours of March 26, before crashing into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, toppling a portion of it, set sail despite its "unseaworthy" conditions, according to a Monday court filing from the city of Baltimore.

 

In the court document, the city argues that the ship's parent company, Grace Ocean Private Ltd., should be held liable for crashing into the Key Bridge. The filing was in response to Grace Ocean Private Ltd.'s request to limit their liability in damages they have to pay.

 

In previous filings, GOPL has argued that it shouldn't be held liable for the crash that left six construction workers dead and a length of the bridge wiped out.

 

The owner of the Dali cargo ship filed a federal lawsuit earlier this month denying responsibility for the accident and seeking to limit the total payout to $43.7 million, a fraction of the billions the cleanup and bridge rebuild is expected to cost. The company is using a law from 1851, the Limitation of Liability Act from that year, in its quest to limit its liability.

 

"Reporting has indicated that, even before leaving port, alarms showing inconsistent power supply on the Dali had sounded," a lawyer for the city of Baltimore said in the filing. "The Dali left port anyways despite its clearly unseaworthy condition."

 

The Dali's "negligence" is grounds for the company to pay the city for the incident, the city argues.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

First container ship arrives at Port of Baltimore since Key Bridge collapse

 

The first container ship arrived at the Port of Baltimore since the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed more than a month ago.

 

The MSC Cargo Passion III made it through the 35-foot temporary channel on Sunday carrying nearly 1,000 containers.

 

Four temporary channels have been opened since the bridge’s collapse on March 26.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Trapped cargo ship Dali will refloat to Baltimore Monday at high tide

 

Almost two months after its devastating collision with a Baltimore bridge, the trapped cargo ship Dali will refloat and travel to the Baltimore marine terminal on Monday morning, officials said.

 

After weeks of salvage operations, the Dali can finally be relocated thanks to a series of controlled explosions which broke apart a massive piece of the Francis Scott Bridge that had been stuck atop the ship’s bow, officials said. An estimated 500-foot section of the bridge weighing 8-12 million pounds was removed from the ship.

 

“The refloat and transit sequence is deliberately designed to ensure all response personnel around the M/V Dali maintain control of the vessel, from refloat, transit to, and berthing at a local marine terminal,” Unified Command said in a news release Saturday.

 

Conditions permitting, the massive ship’s journey will begin around 5 a.m. on Monday during peak high tide, according to Unified Command. Crews will begin prepping the ship about 18 hours before – about midday on Sunday – to take full advantage of the high tide, officials added.

 

Up to five tugboats will then tow and push the Dali about two and a half miles to the Seagirt Marine Terminal in Baltimore, the release said. It will take an estimated three hours to transport the 984-foot, 106,000-ton ship.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[tshile]

I’m surprised there were no repairs needed to allow it to float. Would have thought there’d be some damage causing it to take on water somehow

[stoshuaj]

Chief, how are things looking from your vantage point now that it’s been moved?

 

Also, is traffic the nightmare that they initially predicted?  It doesn’t look bad at all on Google driving map.

Edited Monday at 02:40 PM by stoshuaj

[TheGreatBuzz]

44 minutes ago, stoshuaj said:

Chief, how are things looking from your vantage point now that it’s been moved?

 

Also, is traffic the nightmare that they initially predicted?  It doesn’t look bad at all on Google driving map.

 

I actually haven't gone up to look. My legs and stuff aren't feeling it today. I'll try to get a picture tomorrow. As for traffic, leaving O's games is noticeably worse but that's about it. Yesterday, we tried a different route that seemed better. I think part of the problem is people that dont know their way around. When its just me going to a game, i take my electric scooter there and back so i make traffic my ****. Beyond games, we rarely go to that side of town otherwise so we didn't expect to notice it a lot.

[China]

Ship that caused deadly Baltimore Key bridge collapse towed to port

 

Recovery teams have refloated and begun towing the cargo vessel that crashed into a bridge in the United States city of Baltimore in March, bringing down the span and killing six people.

 

Live television images of the operation on Monday morning showed a flotilla of tugboats pushing and towing the MV Dali away from the remains of the shattered Francis Scott Key Bridge and towards a marine terminal.

 

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Simmsy]

13 hours ago, China said:

Ship that caused deadly Baltimore Key bridge collapse towed to port

 

Recovery teams have refloated and begun towing the cargo vessel that crashed into a bridge in the United States city of Baltimore in March, bringing down the span and killing six people.

 

Live television images of the operation on Monday morning showed a flotilla of tugboats pushing and towing the MV Dali away from the remains of the shattered Francis Scott Key Bridge and towards a marine terminal.

 

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

Wow, even after all the videos and all this time, I still can't imagine the sheer size of this thing.