Francis Scott Key bridge is no more - video

[matemike]

Curious why a ship that large wouldn't have tugs assisting with maneuvering? Is that not a thing for these large cargo vessels? YTB types.....

This is a yes and no question. First and foremost, there needs to be tug availability and the use of tugs comes at a financial cost to the shipping companies. If they don't NEED assist tug(s) they certainly don't want to pay for it. It is common to "wrap a vessel in tugs" for many reasons in pilotage waters though; some of those being if the ship is deep laden, if the weatheris bad (high winds or currents) or there is a known mechanical issue before hand. Pilot groups or port authorities will usually have a set of parameters (vessel size, draft, wind speed etc) that makes the use of tugs past a certain point compulsory. A channel would normally be shut down to all other traffic until a ship with a known mechanical issue is cleared. This issue was obviously unknown so not discussed and no need for assist tugs.

The waterway appeared to be pretty clear of traffic that night and the vessel had plenty of room in the channel by both width and depth of the channel, as well as good weather. A standard calculation for ship beam to channel width is 51%. Meaning a ship will have enough room to maneuver in a channel so long as its beam is 51% or less of the channel width. The Dhali has a beam of 48m, (158'). So, as long as the channel is at least 315' wide, which I believe it is much more than that, then tug assist the whole way out is really unnecessary. Nothing that I saw warranted the use of tugs other than the standard use just to get the ship off the dock, once at a safe distance and in a good position it gets turned or spun around if needed with the tug assist and then the tugs are let go and the ship carries on under its own power and steering. Also, the transit speed of 8.5 knots was about perfect for maneuverability and safety. The ship could probably make 12 or 14 knots if on full ahead, and over 17 knots if at sea speed, but dead slow ahead she would probably only make 3 knots and hard to steer.
8.5kts was a good safe sweet spot IMO.

[HKGuns]

Thanks.

[Adrenaline_6]

A good perspective from someone with experience. It echoes a lot of what matemike mentioned.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/202...failure-pilot/

[Artos]

Vid regarding the black box...this chap is suggesting some of important 411 is missing.

https://twitter.com/MJTruthUltra/sta...61956419665964

[AKDoug]

Vid regarding the black box...this chap is suggesting some of important 411 is missing.

https://twitter.com/MJTruthUltra/sta...61956419665964

That chap is a clown.

[FromMyColdDeadHand]

Vid regarding the black box...this chap is suggesting some of important 411 is missing.

https://twitter.com/MJTruthUltra/sta...61956419665964

That chap is a clown.

We are missing the:

— rutter angle

Ruhh-rowww, Shaggy!

[Diamondback]

Interesting timeline video.

My take: Much like Titanic, panicked action trying to prevent disaster CAUSED more harm than simply riding it out.

1. At moment of power failure, by simply doing nothing and waiting to do anything beyond get power back until the other side of the bridge, inertia would have carried the ship safely past the pier based on the tracks I saw.
2. At the anchor drop, Starboard bit into the channel floor but Port did not--in pictures you can see the starboard anchor chain clearly pulling under stress while the port chain just casually hangs straight down into the water.
3. On a single-screw ship with normal rotation, Back Full carries a LOT of torque that causes a fast starboard heel even if you have the rudders set trying to compensate for it.
4. Items 2 and 3 together creating a lot of starboard-heel inertia combined with loss of forward inertia would explain the sudden swing onto collision course. Much like Captain Smith in 1912, attempting to alter course created disaster where holding course would have totally or mostly averted it. (We will set the sulphur-contaminated steel and bad rivet issues aside... instead of heeling to the side at Ahead Full and getting torn open like a tin can, let's say Smith takes the berg straight in the prow after setting all engines Back Full. Forward 1-2 compartments are basically toast with major loss of life, but the ship is still in shape to make emergency repairs as much as possible and limp to nearest port or a worst buy time for other ships to bring aid.)

[prepare]

There's some interesting speculation Russia is behind a cyber attack on this ship. Retribution for Nord stream and the Crimea bridge among others. Not mention sending a message that the US can no longer act with impunity in the new multi-polar world order.

[Coal Dragger]

Events like this always bring out the conspiracy retards.

They are still retards, and if you buy into the nonsense before investigations and findings are out you’re probably a retard too. Why in the hell do people feel the need to go hunting for overly complicated explanations for events like this, when more strait forward and simple explanations are accurate 99.9999999999999% of the time?

Are people in this country now so friggin’ stupid that they can’t use reason to deduct what is and is not credible? I guess so.

The simple explanation here is that the transportation industry from trucking, railroads, airlines, to maritime maintains equipment to the bare minimum of functional. They will run equipment until it fails, or times out for mandatory inspections. Doing anything more than that costs money and eats into their precious operating ratios. They don’t give a shit about safety of their crews or the public even one inch beyond what they need to show to avoid legal liability.

You guys see a conspiracy, ...... I see a 984’ long 96,000 ton motor vessel with a mixed bag crew that don’t even speak one common language as a native tongue. The crew is also the bare minimum number of bodies required to operate the vessel. This ship is being run hard and maintained to the bare minimums of the flagging nation, the crew is trained to those bare minimums. Better maintenance and training costs money, money the owners are not going to spend. Even when issues are reported by the crew the owners probably tell them to suck a bag of dicks or find a different job. So eventually things break, sometimes they break at a really bad time.

[Sam]

Don't insult other members.