Country Keepers by Gary Petersen

Please take a moment to say a prayer for the people in and around Minneapolis. The bridge that carries Interstate 35W over the Mississippi River collapsed during rush hour this evening, killing at least six people as their cars fell with the bridge into the river.

Television station WCCO has many pictures and videos as does the Minneapolis Star and Tribune.

The image to the right, which is from the Associated Press, shows the entire bridge, or rather the entire collapse. The bridge was under repair, but apparently only the concrete decking, not the structure below, so there is no immediate and obvious reason why it would have collapsed.

Officials suspect only structural failure, not any sort of attack.

I’ve driven over that bridge and, like any other bridge, never given it a second thought. I’ll drive over similar bridges on my way to work tomorrow and likely won’t give that a second thought either. It is hard to imagine something like this happening.

02-Aug Update: CNN has video from a security camera showing the bridge collapse.  The camera is at street level below where the bridge deck was.

Filed under: General