The Dali vessel that was at the very start of a 27-day journey from the port of Baltimore to Sri Lanka had completely lost power after leaving the port and was hurtling towards the city’s signature Francis Scott Key Bridge.
It was in the middle of the night and the crew onboard were plunged into further darkness when the ship’s lights suddenly went out too, losing vision of the direction eventually hitting Baltimore bridge.
Multiple alarms had rung as the crew had run unsuccessful tests in a desperate and life threatening attempt to fix the issue and regain power in the vessel.
Shortly before 01:30 (05:30 GMT), they issued a mayday call to the Baltimore authorities warning the authorities that a collision was to occur.
“There’s a ship approaching that has lost their steering,” an official with the Maryland Transportation Authority can be heard saying in radio traffic recorded not long after. “Until you’ve got that under control, we’ve got to stop all traffic.”
Wes Moore, the Maryland Governor later praised the crew as “heroes” and said that their quick response had “saved lives” because authorities were able to stop the flow of vehicle traffic onto the bridge in the two minutes between the call and the collision to occur.
It did not, however, stop what happened when the Dali slammed into a concrete column on the 1.5-mile (2.4km) bridge, which quickly collapsed into the Patapsco River, Baltimore
Six people – all believed to be members of a road crew working on the bridge – are presumed dead due to the water temperature and time that has passed. The US Coast Guard said in the late evening on Tuesday that it had concluded the men had died and to suspend its massive search and rescue effort, which had been complicated by cold and cloudy weather.
Local media that had reported that the six workers were citizens of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. All 22 crew on the ship were Indian.
Maryland Governor responds
“This is a place that is a normal commute route for 30,000 Marylanders every single day. To hear the words ‘the Key Bridge has collapsed’ is shocking. It’s heartbreaking,” Mr Moore said at a news conference on Tuesday.
“For over 47 years, it is all that we’ve known.”
What exactly led to the loss of power and engines on board the Dali vessel remains unclear as it has not been confirmed by the makers yet.
According to Vessel Finder, a tracking website, the ship was involved in another collision in the port of Antwerp in 2016. There were no injuries or significant damage reported at the time, the second crash is now at Baltimore.
As night ended on Tuesday, the ship and its load of 3,000 containers that were intended to be shipped to Sri Lanka had remained on the Patapsco River in the Baltimore City.
