WASHINGTON - The body of a fourth construction worker who died after a bridge collapsed when it was struck by a container ship in the US city of Baltimore in March has been recovered, officials said on April 15.
The Francis Scott Key Bridge, a major transit route for the busy city and port of Baltimore in Maryland, collapsed on March 26 when the Dali container ship lost power and collided into a support column, killing six roadway construction workers.
The Key Bridge response team’s Unified Command said it had recovered the body of the “fourth missing construction worker” on April 14 at the site of the bridge collapse.
“Unified Command salvage teams located what they believed to be one of the missing construction vehicles and promptly notified” Maryland state police, according to a statement.
The authorities “responded and located a deceased victim trapped inside the vehicle”, it added, without identifying the deceased.
Mexico’s Foreign Minister Alicia Barcena said on April 15 that the body of Mexican national Carlos Daniel Hernandez, who had worked on the bridge, was recovered.
“Carlos Daniel represents our Mexican workers in the United States,” she wrote on social media site X.
Another Mexican national, identified as 35-year-old Alejandro Hernandez Fuentes, was also killed.
His remains were located soon after the collapse, as were those of 26-year-old Guatemalan Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera.
Dive teams recovered the body of another missing worker, 38-year-old Maynor Yasir Suazo-Sandoval, on April 5, Unified Command earlier said.
The 300m Dali ship had managed to issue a Mayday call in the moments before the collision which gave police time to stop traffic on the bridge, likely saving lives.
But an eight-man construction crew repairing potholes on the bridge could not be reached in time, and plummeted with the tonnes of concrete and twisted steel into the Patapsco River.
Two workers were rescued alive, one briefly hospitalised and the other uninjured.
The FBI has launched a criminal probe targeting the container ship, US media reported on April 15. AFP
