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President Joe Biden said Tuesday he’s directed his team to “move heaven and earth” to get the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore rebuilt and the port reopened after the bridge collapsed early Tuesday morning when it was struck by a container ship.
Biden said he plans for the federal government to pay the entire cost of reconstruction.
- Full Key Bridge collapse coverage
- Photos of the collapse
- How did container ship strike bring down Baltimore’s Key Bridge? An expert weighs in
Ship traffic in the Port of Baltimore has been suspended, Biden said, until the channel can be cleared.
He called it “the top port in America, both imports and exports of automobiles and light trucks, around 850,000 vehicles go through that port every single year. And we’re gonna get it up and running again as soon as possible.”
He noted that 15,000 jobs “depend on that port. And we’re gonna do everything we can to protect those jobs and help those workers.”
He said the Army Corps of Engineers is there to help clear the channel.
“As I told (Maryland) Gov. Moore, I’m directing my team move heaven and earth, reopen the port and rebuild the bridge as soon as humanly possible.”
Biden also said it is his “intention that the federal government will pay for the entire cost of reconstructing that bridge. And I expect the Congress to support my effort.”
“It’s going to take some time,” Biden said. “The people of Baltimore can count on us to stick with them at every step of the way.”
Asked whether the company behind the ship that rammed the bridge should foot the bill, Biden said: “We’re not going to wait for that to happen. We’re gonna pay for it to get the bridge rebuilt and reopened.”
The president said he plans to travel to Baltimore “as quickly as I can.”
Watch Biden’s full remarks below.
‘One of the cathedrals of American infrastructure’
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg joined Maryland Gov. Wes Moore on Tuesday afternoon both to offer support and note that rebuilding will be no simple task.
“This is no ordinary bridge. This is one of the cathedrals of American infrastructure,” Buttigieg said at a news conference in Baltimore. “It has been part of the skyline for this region for longer than many of us have been alive.”
“So the path to normalcy will not be easy. It will not be quick. It will not be inexpensive, but we will rebuild together.”
Buttigieg said the Maritime Administration will assist with port harbor and supply chain operations.
The Federal Highway Administration will assist when it comes to the bridge itself and any ways that “we can help ease roadway congestion for residents and commuters who can no longer use this major thoroughfare,” he said.
“The Federal Aviation Administration is even involved working to keep the airspace above the bridge clear for emergency personnel.”
‘One Maryland’ ethos
Tuesday was a tough day in the Maryland General Assembly as lawmakers grappled with the impact of the collapse of Baltimore’s Key Bridge.
Del. Marc Korman, chair of the Environment and Transportation Committee, kicked off Tuesday’s meeting by telling his colleagues, “Our thoughts are with the directly impacted families and also the incredible first responders” who raced to save lives “in the middle of the night.”
Later in an interview with WTOP, Korman explained that while lawmakers may have their differences, “We have sort of a ‘one Maryland’ ethos here, and it’s not that big a state.”
He added, “We all have driven over the Key Bridge, we all know people who live around there.”
When asked about the impact of the pledge from the Biden Administration to get congressional approval for the cost of replacing the bridge, Korman said that’s helpful. While he said they’re in “the immediate aftermath” of the bridge collapse, “of course, we’re going to want to rebuild. Baltimore’s a resilient city, and Maryland’s a resilient state, and so we’re going to build back,” but, he said, that will take time to “get into place.”
In the meantime, an April 1 budget deadline looms in the General Assembly, and Korman said there is some debate on how to handle a roughly $3 billion six-year shortfall. Korman said the legislature has been working toward solving the problem of providing “the infrastructure dollars we need for the infrastructure that Maryland wants.”
What could be considered when rebuilding the bridge
Built decades ago, the bridge lacked some of the improvements developed over the years to make the structure safer. Some bridges have protection near supports to deflect some of the blow from a potential ship strike.
“We won’t know for quite some time as to what sort of protections for the bridge structures would have approved prevented this, but certainly it would have helped I think,” Rick Geddes, infrastructure policy expert and director of the Cornell University Infrastructure Policy Program, told WTOP’s Mike Murillo.
He said enhanced protection against ship-bridge collisions needs to be a focus, since there are sensors that, once embedded in the bridge, can communicate with approaching ships.
Other sensors available can let officials know of problems with the structure before a catastrophic failure.
“Things they can tell you about (are) the vibration, the temperature, the alkalinity in the concrete,” Geddes said.
He said paying for the project is also something still to be discussed, pointing out that other states, following disasters, leaned on public private partnerships to rebuild and maintain rebuilt bridges.
Geddes also calls on lawmakers to look at infrastructure funding that helps pay for improvements and work that would protect bridges from possible threats, both natural and man-made.
“We need to focus on improving the resilience of our infrastructure, and that could be redundancies that are built into the design and construction of the infrastructure.”
WTOP’s Kate Ryan, Mike Murillo, Jessica Kronzer and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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