Biden visits Baltimore to assess bridge collapse damage

During a visit to the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse site on Friday, President Joe Biden pledged federal support for the recovery effort while offering his condolences to the families of six workers killed when a container ship collided with the bridge last week.

Here's what you should know about his visit:

President Joe Biden on Friday referenced a portion of the US national anthem — written by the namesake of the Francis Scott Key Bridge — to say that Baltimore will make it through the challenges presented by the bridge's collapse.

"This port is older than our republic. It's been through tough, tough times before," the president said.

Key wrote the poem that eventually became "The Star-Spangled Banner" while watching a British assault on the harbor during the War of 1812.

"As the dawn broke," the president said, "we saw the American flag still flying. Baltimore was still standing, and our nation, as he wrote in 'The Star-Spangled Banner,' had made it through a "perilous fight."

"Folks," Biden added. "That's going to take time. ... We're determined to come back even stronger."

President Joe Biden on Friday said he hopes the channel closed off by the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge last week will be reopened by May.

"So far, our team has been able to clear two small channels for essential ships, helping clear the wreckage," Biden said.

A third channel for some commercial traffic — including car carriers, which used Baltimore as a crucial port for US imports — should be opened by the end of this month, Biden said.

"By the end of May, we'll open the full channel," he said.

More context: The US Army Corps of Engineers announced Thursday it plans to fully reopen the channel leading to the Baltimore port by the end of May. While the dangerous work of clearing the channel to the Port of Baltimore continues, the US Army Corps of Engineers Baltimore District said it plans to open a “limited access channel” that will be about 280 feet wide by the end of April.

President Joe Biden on Friday referred to his own experience of loss while referencing the families of the six construction workers who were killed when the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed last week.

"The anger, the pain, the depth of loss is so profound," he added, noting that one day the memory of a loved one "is going to bring a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye."

Biden is expected to meet with some of the relatives of those killed on the bridge after his remarks conclude.

President Joe Biden told Baltimore the country has its back as the city recovers from last Tuesday's collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge.

On President Joe Biden's first stop in Baltimore, he was briefed by Brigadier Gen. John Lloyd, who commands the North Atlantic Division for the US Army Corps of Engineers, on recovery efforts around the Key Bridge collapse to open the channel.

Lloyd outlined challenges facing the team, noting as he’s visited the site, there is “a lot of bridge resting on that vessel,” which will require engineers to cut the vessel and lift it out of the channel. Still, he said, “the cooperation is fantastic—the best I’ve ever seen,” offering special praise for Maryland Gov. Wes Moore.

Biden was then briefed on rebuilding efforts before hearing from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on the federal response. Buttigieg said the department has supported Maryland in four main areas: "Help them get the port back open, deal with the supply chain applications in the meantime, helping get the bridge back up and deal with the surface traffic implications.”

The transportation secretary touted $60 million in emergency relief to the region “within hours of it coming in.” He also pledged "that is a down payment, and just the beginning, but as more requests come in, we'll make sure that we can turn them around right away too."

The group is now moving to the banks of the river for Biden’s remarks.

As the local community begins the difficult work needed to return to some sense of normality after the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed, experts say that, at the very least, the local economy will likely withstand the effects of the bridge’s collapse.

The collapse will indeed have some economic impact, but it will likely be limited.

Here’s a snapshot of Baltimore’s regional economy and why it’ll be likely spared from an economic disaster:

President Joe Biden will see federal response efforts firsthand and receive an aerial tour of the damage caused by the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore during his visit to the city Friday, a White House official said.

“President Biden will travel to Baltimore where he will receive an operational update on response efforts from the Unified Command, including the Coast Guard and Army Corps of Engineers on assistance to state officials in surveying and removing the wreckage in the channel and allowing the Port of Baltimore to reopen as soon as humanly possible,” the official said in a statement released Thursday night.

Biden will also meet with the loved ones of the six construction workers killed when the bridge collapsed last week, the official added.

The president will be joined by:

Before its disastrous collapse last week, the Francis Scott Key Bridge served as an economically crucial gateway: Thousands of container ships crossing from the Atlantic to Baltimore’s port passed under the bridge’s decades-old span.

But the now-ruined structure isn’t the only bridge along that same key shipping route: Twenty miles downstream, massive container ships headed to Baltimore also pass under the Chesapeake Bay Bridge near Annapolis.

And according to experts who reviewed its design for CNN, it could also be at risk of collapse if one of those vessels rammed into it.

Several of the 4-mile-long Bay Bridge’s concrete piers, which sit in the middle of the shipping channel, appear vulnerable to the type of ship collision that destroyed the Key Bridge, experts said.

The bridge is “lacking in safety measures,” said Adel ElSafty, an engineering professor at the University of North Florida, who said the structure should be reassessed in light of the Key Bridge collapse. “It could very much be vulnerable to a ship impact.”

CNN reviewed the protective design features of more than a dozen major US bridges that cross shipping channels leading to the biggest ports in the country.

Most have stronger defenses against ship collisions than the Key Bridge had, such as more robust fender systems or larger concrete structures designed to deflect oncoming vessels, according to statements from local officials and interviews with more than a half-dozen structural engineering experts.

But a handful of other bridges, including the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, have less significant defenses, according to experts – potentially placing them at risk as increasingly large container ships pass under them.

Read more about what other US bridges are facing.