Loose wire caused Dali ship to crash into Baltimore bridge, NTSB finds

A loose signal cable caused the power outage that caused the Dali cargo ship to crash into Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said Tuesday, accusing the Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) of failing to evaluate the bridge’s ability to withstand a ship strike.

The collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge occurred early on March 26, 2024, when the container ship Dali lost power and struck a support pier, causing the spans to fall into the Patapsco River.

The NTSB’s final report found that a single misplaced cable caused total loss of power, leaving Dali without propulsion or steering just before the crash. The board said the tragedy could have been prevented if Maryland had followed safety recommendations issued years ago.

“The National Transportation Safety Board determined that the probable cause of the Dali container ship’s contact with the Francis Scott Key Bridge was an electrical power outage due to a loose signal cable connection to a terminal block resulting from improper installation of wireless tag tape,” the board said. he said.

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Investigators said the crew responded quickly to the power outage but had little time to restore power before the ship hit the bridge. The ship’s proximity to the opening, combined with delays in rebooting its systems, made collision inevitable.

The report also faulted the MDTA for failing to conduct a vulnerability assessment, a step recommended by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials to identify ways to protect bridges from ship attacks.

What contributed to the collapse, the NTSB said, was “a lack of countermeasures that would have reduced the bridge’s vulnerability to collapse due to impact by ocean liners and that could have been implemented had a vulnerability assessment been conducted.”

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Part of the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge hangs onto the Dali container ship in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, March 26, 2024. USA (Comment via Army Corps of Engineers/REUTERS)

Engineers testified that the Dali crew misused the wash pump as a service pump; This was a practice that the ship’s operator, Synergy Marine Group, was unable to detect or stop. This mishandling limited the ship’s ability to restore power after a power outage.

The NTSB also criticized Synergy for allowing critical electrical systems to operate in manual mode rather than automatic, which prevented Dali from recovering from the power outage.

“Staff found that Synergy’s operational oversight was inadequate because the crew did not terminate the scrubber pump’s continued use as a service pump for diesel generators on the Dali and at least one other vessel,” NTSB engineer Bart Barnum said.

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Part of the collapsed bridge over a cargo ship. (FBI Baltimore)

The board also found that communications failures prevented timely warnings to highway workers who had no chance of evacuation before the bridge collapsed.

The NTSB’s findings came a day after Maryland officials said reconstruction of the Francis Scott Key Bridge would take two years longer than expected and cost more than double the original estimate. State engineers now say the project won’t be completed until 2030 and could cost up to $5.2 billion; That figure is up from the initial estimate of $1.9 billion used to secure federal funding.

Jim Harkness, MDTA’s chief engineer, told The Washington Post that inflation and market factors are driving the increase.

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“It’s difficult to estimate on these larger projects,” he said. “Market factors, those all come into play.” Transport Minister Sean Duffy predicted in August that the final bill would be “double” the initial estimate when federal dollars were transferred.

The NTSB’s findings paint a picture of cascading failures, from a single faulty cable to years of missed safety precautions, that led to one of the deadliest infrastructure disasters in Maryland history.

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As the state works to rebuild the bridge, rising costs and timeline delays underscore how deeply the collapse continues to ripple through Maryland’s economy and infrastructure.

Fox News Digital’s Anders Hagstrom contributed to this report.