Dwarfing the tugboats to which it was tethered, the container ship Dali returned to the Port of Baltimore Monday morning after crews freed the vessel that had been stranded in the Patapsco River since it struck and collapsed the Francis Scott Key Bridge on March 26.
Crews refloated the vessel around 6:40 a.m., and 20 minutes later, the ship started moving slowly, almost imperceptibly. By 8:40 a.m., tugboats had guided the 984-foot ship into the Seagirt Marine Terminal, still bearing on its lacerated bow a chunk of pavement from the bridge.
“We took an enormous step forward in our mission to recover from the collapse,” Gov. Wes Moore said in a statement.
Moore, who watched the operation from a boat about 500 feet from the Dali, lauded those who worked safely and speedily in the massive and ongoing recovery effort led by the Key Bridge Response Unified Command. That’s the multiagency effort led by the Coast Guard, Army Corps of Engineers, the Maryland Department of the Environment, the Maryland Transportation Authority, and state police.
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The Dali is expected to remain in port for a few weeks and eventually travel to Norfolk, Virginia, for repairs.
A friend reportedly got up early in the morning to watch the ship get dragged to the dock on TV. It was very boring. Boring is good when it comes to ships.
The 400 ft wide, 50 ft deep Federal channel is supposed to be open for traffic today, allowing the port to get back to full business. Meanwhile, clearing rubble will continue, while the politicos try to figure out what to do about the bridge.
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