Many people have been feared dead as a major bridge collapsed in the US city of Baltimore after it was hit by a cargo ship.
The Maryland Transportation Authority confirmed this in a post on X early Tuesday, March 26, 2024.
“I-695 Key Bridge collapse due to ship strike,” the MTA posted on social media platform X, referring to the interstate highway.
It urged drivers to avoid the route over the Patapsco River, which it called an “active scene”.
Footage shows a large section of the 1.6 mile-long Francis Scott Key Bridge falling into the Patapsco River, following the collision at around 1.30am local time (5.30am UK time).
Vehicles can be seen in the video falling from the bridge.
Baltimore’s fire service said emergency teams were searching for at least seven people.
Chief Kevin Cartwright, director of communications for the Baltimore City Fire Department, said its main focus right now was “trying to rescue and recover these people”.
He said it was too early to know how many people were affected, but described the collapse as a “developing mass casualty event”.
Earlier, the MTA had said interstate lanes in both directions were closed due to an “incident” on the bridge and that traffic was being redirected.
Ship monitoring website MarineTraffic showed a Singapore-flagged container ship called the Dali stopped under the bridge early Tuesday.
Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scoot and Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski Jr both said they were aware of the incident and that rescue efforts were underway.
“Please pray for those impacted,” Olszewski posted on X.
A bridge in the US city of Baltimore has entirely collapsed into the Patapsco River after being hit by a container ship pic.twitter.com/rqv5RKgYSC
— Star Potter🇺🇸🇳🇬 (@Star_Potter2) March 26, 2024
