The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore collapsed in the early morning hours of Tuesday, according to the Maryland Transportation Authority. The cause of the collapse was a container ship striking a column, which sent the bridge into the water of the Patapsco River below. And, strangely enough, the entire thing was captured on video during a livestream.
The YouTube livestream, maintained by Streamtime Live is one of at least nine currently broadcasting, with others that show places like New York Harbor, Port Huron in Michigan, and Chicago’s Midway Airport. The livestream didn’t capture any audio of the incident.
The Associated Press reports that several vehicles have fallen into the water, a claim that seems supported by the video evidence. But there’s no official word yet on whether any people were on the bridge when it collapsed. Early reports from the Baltimore Sun indicate there may have been at least seven construction workers on the bridge when it collapsed but that hasn’t been confirmed.
Video shared by the news aggregator Raw Alerts on X appeared to show another angle on the bridge collapse, with someone shouting obscenities. And while it looks like the same bridge collapse, it’s not clear who originally captured the video.
Adam Parker, an open source investigator from the UK’s Sky News identified the container ship as the Singapore-flagged Dali. It’s not immediately clear the condition of the ship nor how many crew may have been on board.
The mayor of Baltimore, Brandon M. Scott, tweeted early Tuesday we was in contact with the governor of Maryland as well as emergency responders. And local traffic has been alerted to avoid the southeast corridor of I-695.
“MAJOR BALTIMORE TRAFFIC ALERT: AVOID I-695 southeast corridor. I-695 Key Bridge collapse due to ship strike. Active scene. Use I-95 or I-895,” Maryland Transportation Authority tweeted at 3:20 a.m. ET.
The four-lane Francis Scott Key Bridge, named for the author of the National Anthem and often shortened to just the Key Bridge, opened in 1977 and stretches 1.6-miles.
This is a developing news story and will be updated.
Source: Gizmodo