States spend to reinforce at-risk bridges after Baltimore bridge collapse

The Lower Columbia River is a 100-mile stretch from Portland, Oregon, past Longview, Washington, to Astoria, Oregon, and the Pacific Ocean, that presents numerous hazards: to ocean-going vessels transiting the winding shipping channel, to workers onshore and onboard, to traffic crossing the river on aging bridges.

The Lewis and Clark Bridge, a nearly 100-year-old, two-lane cantilever span that crosses the Lower Columbia at Longview, could be harboring safety hazards of its own.

After the fatal collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore in March 2024, the National Transportation Safety Board conducted a national survey to identify other bridges around the country that could face a similar risk. It found 68 that were built before the mid-1990s, when new engineering safety standards for bridges were implemented, of which 34 were identified as “critical/essential” to the U.S. transportation network.

Two of those bridges are on the Lower Columbia: The Astoria-Megler Bridge, built in 1966, is in Astoria, at the mouth of the river. The other — the Lewis and Clark Bridge, constructed in 1929, in Longview — is 50 miles upriver. Fifty miles further upriver is the Port of Portland, gateway to a vast inland river-network that brings grain and mineral exports by barge, truck, and rail to ocean-going vessels headed for world markets.

A steady stream of ships navigate this part of the river, past rail yards and port facilities loading grain, potash, logs, and cars.

I boarded a 47-foot launch with Columbia River Launch Service Captain Tyson Hill. He shuttles pilots, port officials and crews to ships. He steered the boat to the center of the river to pass under the Lewis & Clark Bridge.

“You can see the channel right here,” he said. “It definitely gets close to the Washington side. I hadn’t noticed that before.”

The channel for ocean-going vessels — which Tyson can see on a screen from his pilot’s chair — makes a tricky turn, then passes close to one of the bridge’s spindly support towers. The towers have no protective bumpers, called “fenders,” to defend against a wayward ship.

“It’s a single-point failure bridge, much like the Francis Scott Key Bridge,” explained Captain Jeremy Nielsen, president of the Columbia River Pilots, who go onboard to guide every large ship navigating the river. “So if you hit that support tower, if the top of the ship hits the underside of the bridge, that whole bridge is coming down.”

Nielsen said there have been close calls. The Pilots shared a video with me: It shows a huge cruise ship, sounding like a train engine, churning towards the bridge on its way back to sea from a Portland shipyard.

There’s no sound from the crew as the ship’s front radar tower passes close under the bridge span, cars and trucks whizzing by overhead. Then the rear tower barely squeaks by, with just four feet to spare.

Other heavily laden ships have lost power and barely missed hitting the bridge, said Nielsen. Part of the danger comes from the size of today’s ships: “The largest vessels that we see — 1,200-foot container ships — until you stand up next to one, it’s tough to grasp how big those really are. So our safety margins have decreased dramatically.”

The problem certainly isn’t limited to the Columbia.

Maria Lehman is former president of the American Society of Civil Engineers and currently a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo. She said that bridges erected before the 1990s weren’t built to accommodate today’s big ships.

“In the ‘70s container ships had 3,000 to 4,000 containers,” said Lehman. “Today it’s 20,000 to 24,000. So that’s five to eight times increase. Their length, their beam, their draft, they have more mass than they did, which means they have much more momentum.”

Risks have mounted in recent decades, said Rick Geddes, director of the Program in Infrastructure Policy at Cornell University. But it took the bridge collapse in Baltimore to bring those risks front and center for the public and policymakers.

“The bridge and dock and crane infrastructure hasn’t kept pace with the increasing size of the container ships,” said Geddes. “We need to think more carefully about this mismatch between the container ships, which are not going to get any smaller or lighter, and the marine infrastructure that we have. The Key Bridge collapse was a real wake-up call. We need to protect the piers and the towers that the bridges stand on.”

In the Pacific Northwest, pilots, ship owners, ports, and local governments have long advocated for safety improvements, said Kate Mickelson, executive director of the Columbia River Steamship Operators’ Association.

“What the Dali incident did nationally was reinforce the importance of continuing to modernize critical maritime infrastructure and prioritize navigation safety needs, before an incident occurs, rather than after one,” Mickelson said.

If a Columbia River bridge did fail, the economic repercussions would be felt for hundreds of miles inland — as far as Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska and the Dakotas, explained Neil Maunu, executive director of the Pacific Northwest Waterways Association.

“Our river system is the number one wheat export gateway in the country; number two and three for corn and soybeans,” said Maunu. “Annually, that’s over $31 billion worth of commodity value.”

The two aging bridges on the Lower Columbia are also critical to surface transportation. They are the only two places cars and trucks can cross the river between Portland and the Pacific. The risk is front-of-mind for Washington State Sen. Jeff Wilson, who represents the region.

“I have the two most vulnerable bridges for commercial traffic in the state,” said Wilson. “The Astoria-Megler Bridge, some things have bumped into it, that’s concerning alone. Trucks now weigh well over 100,000 pounds, and in 1930 when the Lewis & Clark Bridge opened, it wasn’t built for that.”

Wilson points to another safety concern: the path of the federal ship channel transiting the Lewis & Clark Bridge. “Those ships go awfully close to the Port of Longview — third or fourth largest port in the state for tonnage and activity,” said Wilson. “As you’re standing on the docks of Longview you can see their faces on the ships.”

It’s a worry shared by the Columbia River Pilots. “The support towers, both of them are in the water, but one of them is just 80 feet from the federal navigation channel,” said Capt. Jeremy Nielsen. “And while 80 feet might sound a long ways away if you’re talking about a car driving by something, on a 1,000-foot ship, 80 feet is not very far, especially when you consider there is no fendering, no protection, on that bridge pier at all.”

So, what’s to be done? According to spokespeople for Washington’s and Oregon’s departments of transportation, the two states will spend $1.35 million over the next 18 months for new safety measures.

That includes conducting a Vessel Impact Vulnerability Assessment ($300,000) to study how at-risk for a vessel collision these bridges are; a Virtual Coordination Center ($750,000, to be paid for by Washington alone) to better track river traffic; and the installation of Air Gap Sensors ($300,000).

“An air-gap sensor accurately measures the distance between the bridge and the top of the river, the channel,” Neil Maunu explained. “We need to have real-time data, and the technology exists for not a lot of money.”

Right now, a pilot, along with a river surveyor, has to estimate their clearance under these bridges, which have sagged and settled with age, on a river that rises and falls with storm surge, tides, snowmelt and dam releases.

Meanwhile, a change to the path of the shipping channel as it transits under the Lewis & Clark Bridge is in the works; it’s been approved by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Coast Guard, according to a Coast Guard spokesperson, who said he expects it to be implemented and for official maps to be changed soon.

Capt. Jeremy Nielsen said he’s hopeful these safety measures will be put in place, as promised. But he hasn’t seen any changes yet, and he’s not holding his breath.

“We’re highly trained,” he said. “We are very, very good pilots. But our skill only goes so far. We need infrastructure improvements, technology, to make sure this river stays safe.”