By now you’ve heard about the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore after it was struck by a cargo ship Tuesday morning, leading to the deaths of six men working on the bridge. Large modern bridges that carry lots of traffic are engineering marvels, except when they aren’t, or when they are hit by ships bigger than they were designed to resist, or when big storms or earthquakes hit. The picture above shows Howard Clifford running away from his abandoned car as the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapsed on November 7, 1940. We previously posted a video of that harrowing bridge failure. The suspension bridge twisted under the force of 40 mph winds until it couldn’t maintain its integrity any longer.
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Smithsonian brings us some information on the Baltimore bridge accident, plus seven other horrific bridge collapses from history. A couple of them were destroyed twice, and a few are accompanied by video of the destruction.
(Image source: UW Digital Collections)
Source: neatorama