OUR PICKS: BALTIMORE BRIDGEBridges Can be Protected from Ship Collisions | Port of Baltimore Bridge Collapse Rattles Supply Chains | Bridge Collapse to Trigger One of the Biggest Insurance Losses in History, and more
· Baltimore Bridge Collapse to Trigger One of the Biggest Insurance Losses in History
Lloyd’s of London warns of multibillion-pound hit after container ship crash
· Failure of Francis Scott Key Bridge Provides Future Engineers a Chance to Learn How to Better Protect the Public
Once engineers understand the forces that a structure will be subjected to, they can design a structure to withstand them
· Port of Baltimore Bridge Collapse Rattles Supply Chains Already Rocked by Troubles in Panama and the Red Sea
In 2023 alone, the port moved around 50 million tons of goods between the U.S. and other countries
· Bridges Can be Protected from Ship Collisions – an Expert on Structures in Disasters Explains How
Theoretically, you could build a structure that would never fail, but you’d have to put infinite money into it. For a critical bridge of this type, we would consider an acceptable chance for failure to be 1 in 10,000 years
· After the Baltimore Bridge Collapse, We Need Clear-Eyed Assessments of the Risks to Key Infrastructure
With many bridges being over 50 years old, a bridge’s condition may have been compromised by deterioration and increased traffic loads, and older bridges were designed to standards that have been superseded by new knowledge and technology
· Baltimore Bridge Collapse Leaves Military Ships on Standby for War Trapped
Rapid reaction vessels intended to supply fighting units around the world are stranded until the wreckage is cleared
Baltimore Bridge Collapse to Trigger One of the Biggest Insurance Losses in History (Michael Bow and Adam Mawardi, The Telegraph)
The Baltimore bridge collapse will trigger one of the largest insurance losses in history, Lloyd’s of London has warned.
The market, founded in 1688 to offer shipping insurance, predicted that the disaster would likely trigger a multibillion-pound loss once all claims are settled.
Lloyd’s said that it could more than withstand the financial hit after a benign period for catastrophes.
Chief executive John Neal said: “This has all the hallmarks of being one of the biggest marine losses in history.”
The Singapore-registered container cargo ship Dali crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore on Tuesday, causing the structure to collapse.
Barclays has predicted that the insurance loss could land between $1bn (£800m) and $3bn.
The ship was insured through Britannia, one of 12 protection and indemnity clubs that insure 90pc of the world’s shipping. Britannia is still assessing the situation as the investigation continues.
Britannia itself is thought to have purchased reinsurance from some of the specialist reinsurers operating in Lloyd’s, which means the losses may feed through to the market.
Failure of Francis Scott Key Bridge Provides Future Engineers a Chance to Learn How to Better Protect the Public (Michael J. Chajes, The Conversation)
Based on the weight and speed of the ship that hit the Francis Scott Key Bridge, today’s U.S. bridge design code would call for the bridge to be designed to resist a lateral force of 11,500 tons. This means the bridge has the ability to withstand a lateral hit of that magnitude. That is equivalent to the weight of about 50 loaded Boeing 777s or the weight of the Eiffel Tower. While this is a very large lateral force, structures can be designed to resist such forces. Tall buildings are routinely designed to resist lateral loads of this magnitude that result from wind or earthquakes. However, it is a matter of how much one wants to spend on the structure, and many design goals and constraints need to be balanced against each other.
Port of Baltimore Bridge Collapse Rattles Supply Chains Already Rocked by Troubles in Panama and the Red Sea (Simona Stan, The Conversation)
The Port of Baltimore is the ninth largest U.S. port by overall trade volume. In 2023 alone, it moved around 50 million tons of goods between the U.S. and other countries, much of
