This week in a city near my hometown, an accident of historic proportions occurred, the downing of the Frances Scott Key bridge. I offer certain selective observations, mostly about how a recovery could languish. These are not guaranteed predictions because the knowledge and capacity exist to do what must be done quickly, but this is akin to a ship navigating treacherous hazards, port and starboard. Even in the first 12-24 hours, there are clues of troubles that might lie in wait. The sinking of the FSK bridge is just the latest in a stream of troubling omens of poor leadership and diminished competence at all levels of government.
In the first 12 hours, the sinking of the bridge was comparable to a 9-11, minus the terrorism. Locally, there was shocked disbelief. By midafternoon of the same day of the accident [there is sufficient explanation for the stated causes, and insufficient evidence for any conspiracy theories at this point], by the time officials declared that the missing were bridge workers, news coverage immediately changed. It was then revealed they were workers fixing potholes. Headlines promptly shrunk further. A short while later, we learned they were all or mostly immigrants, (assumed legal), the next news cycle was now underway, less than 24 hours after the tragedy. While officials lead with words of sympathies for these men, the media is the mirror that reflects the real views and values of poles and public alike.
I have a unique perspective on this bridge tragedy. I’m old enough to have witnessed it’s building. My first adult career was bridge and other infrastructure work. In the final year of the FSK construction, I was a worker building similar bridges literally within sight of the FSK bridge. A short time later, I was engaged with more bridges that completed the final split lane connection for the road to and from the FSK bridge. The company I worked for had their main shipyard less than a mile from the bridge. Their equipment included barge mounted cranes that routinely made extremely heavy maritime lifts. A couple years later, I personally worked on dismantling bridges with similar superstructure as the FSK bridge. Via my late father, a civil engineer in the business, I gained unique insights into the Port of Baltimore and all the other engaged governmental and labor powers that be. All this to say, you will never read another word about this from anyone that has more hands-on knowledge of the matter than what you’re now reading. Those that truly worked, rarely write; those that write rarely if ever truly worked.
Baltimore is in shambles, in advanced stages of woke dereliction. The city government will contribute nothing of value to any restoration. They will suffer greatly from its absence, accelerating their decline. The state of Maryland, until recently under the competent fiscal management of former governor Hogan, will struggle and I predict fail to manage the interim in their own best interest. Union interests will trump public interests and I believe that process is already underway – big time. The bloated golden tit of the federal government is being readied for service, only this time, there are dozens of new special interest groups ready to capitalize on catastrophe, even ones that didn’t exist in 1977. Federally, Biden is ready to hand out money for the restoration but be assured, any cash he dispenses will be tied to reciprocal political advantage. Biden does nothing solely for any common good. Buttleplug provided nothing toward the prevention of the accident, and I predict will stand by while others do the heavy lifting. ‘Mayor Pete’s’ prior resume was providing bike paths. His emphasis as Transportation Secretary has been a dedication to eradicating the internal combustion engine, declaring certain highways as ‘racist’, and the hiring and promotion of more homosexuals, transexuals, and cross dressers into government positions. That’s it. Moreover, one might protest that none of this had any bearing on the actual bridge collapse. That may be true as a technicality, however, when a cabinet member takes the unprecedented step of a leave of absence to – along with his gay husband – ‘chest-feed’ an adopted kid (whom I greatly pity), perhaps that time would have been better spend assessing priorities for transportation spending. I can almost guarantee, that not a dime of the 2021 $1.2 Trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act went toward assessing the structural worthiness of a fifty-year-old bridge where officials lament that ships are now a magnitude larger in size and weight than when the bridge was built. Maybe the Maryland Port Authority could have been blowing the warning whistle on this, but we’ve just learned that their priorities also were woke under the new governor, hiring a new DEI coordinator, a black woman with zero experience in transportation, shipping, ports, or supply chain infrastructure. O how quickly the roosters come home to roost.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m rooting for Baltimore. I helped build it back in the day, but I’m not an optimist here. Baltimore backroom power dealing has always been corrupt and dirty, but quite frankly, while that used to result in getting things done, that doesn’t even matter anymore. We’re now in a system where the locals answer only to the ‘big guy’ and the bug guy is a puppet of his far greater puppet masters. What happens in lowly Baltimore is just a pimple on their ass.
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