Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Sunday there is still no timeline for when the wreckage of the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge and the crippled container ship Dali will be removed so the Port of Baltimore can reopen.
In an interview with ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Buttigieg said the Army Corps of Engineers and the Navy are bringing in a 1,000-ton crane and a 600-ton crane to clear the twisted debris from the channel.
“They have not wanted to speculate yet on a timeline because the operation is so complex,” Buttigieg said. “It’s not that you just have to remove the wreckage, it’s that you have to do it in a way that doesn’t cause portions of the bridge that are there across the water to shift. They’ve been under a lot of compression, tension; they could behave almost like a spring if they are not expertly managed.”
In addition to removing the debris, Buttigieg said the 248 million-pound shipping vessel still poses a problem, saying, “Measures are being taken to stop the ship from swinging into the channel.”
The secretary said part of the $60 million in federal funding released for the cleanup and recovery efforts will also go to the “acquisition, procurement and preparation for the new bridge.”
He said that while other East Coast ports have been absorbing container traffic, the Port of Baltimore is uniquely designed to handle the bulk of automobiles shipped to the United States.
“So as soon as it can safely be reopened, that, of course, is a major priority that really affects our entire national supply system,” Buttigieg said.
