US Coast Guard suspends rescue operations
Guatemala confirms two fellow citizens among the missing, while the others are Mexicans, Hondurans and Salvadorans
Jeffrey Pritzker, the executive vice president of Brawner Builders, the construction company that employs workers on the Baltimore bridge, has presumed dead the six people missing after the structure collapsed following the impact of a container ship.
Pritzker’s announcement came hours after Maryland Governor Wes Moore insisted at a press conference that there is still hope in finding the crew alive after the bridge collapsed on impact.
Following this, the US Coast Guard has announced that it has suspended search and rescue operations for the six missing people, due to the time that has passed since the bridge collapsed and the water temperatures. “We don’t think we’re going to find any of them alive,” said Rear Admiral Shannon Gilreath, referring to the recovery of missing people.
Thus, the search and rescue operations have come to an end around 7:30 p.m. (local time), although the Coast Guard will not leave the scene, but will “simply transition to a different phase.”
Maryland Governor Wes Moore called this news a “truly heartbreaking conclusion to a challenging day,” after using “every resource possible: air, land and sea.” “Although we are now moving toward a recovery mission, we are still fully committed to ensuring that we are using all assets to provide a sense of closure to families,” the governor added.
For his part, Maryland Police Secretary Roland Butler has stated that conditions have made it dangerous for rescuers to be in the water. “The last thing we want to do is put divers in the water with changing currents, low temperatures, very poor visibility and unknown objects in the water,” he said.
While he added that there will be surface ships during the night, he said he expects divers to return to the water around 6 a.m. this Wednesday, when there will be “a better position to understand the dynamics of what we are facing and address the problems.” in a much safer way.”
“Right now, we don’t know where they are, but we intend to do our best to help these families,” he said during a press conference in which he indicated that there is no information to support that there were more vehicles on the bridge when it collapsed. , although there is a “clear possibility.”
LATIN AMERICAN VICTIMS
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala has reported that two of the people missing after the accident on the Patapsco River are two Guatemalan citizens, aged 26 and 35, who were part of the group of workers who were repairing the asphalt on the bridge in the moment of the accident.
“Among the six workers who are still missing, it is believed that there are people of Mexican origin, from Honduras, El Salvador and the two Guatemalans,” reads a statement from the diplomatic portfolio.
The Guatemalan consul in Maryland has contacted the relatives of the missing Guatemalans by telephone. Likewise, she has gone to the area where the families are located, waiting to be able to meet with the siblings of fellow citizens to provide guidance.
“INSUFFICIENT” MANEUVERS AFTER A SHIP BLACKOUT
The crew of the ‘Dali’ boat issued a ‘mayday’ before colliding with the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which ended up falling into the Patapsco River, cutting off traffic and leaving only eight vehicles on the structure when it collapsed. . At the time of the collapse there were eight people crossing the bridge, two of whom have been found alive in the river and taken to a hospital.
American Pilots Association CEO Clay Diamond has said the boat’s pilot did “everything he could have done” to slow the boat and prevent it from veering toward the bridge. The pilot requested that the rudder be turned to port and the anchor be dropped, and he also contacted the pilot office to close traffic to the bridge. “But it happened so quickly and with so little time that none of those maneuvers were enough,” he said.
“Just a few minutes before, there was a total blackout on the ship, which means it lost engine power and electrical energy, it was a total blackout,” he said, before pointing out that the ship’s lights were turned back on by a generator. emergency, but the engines did not work again.
The president of the United States, Joe Biden, announced this Tuesday that he will present a proposal to Congress for the federal government to assume the cost of repairing the bridge. “I hope Congress will support this proposal,” he said.
