The Oklahoma State Patrol said Saturday that it closed a highway south of Sallisaw after a barge struck a bridge over Arkansas River.

Troopers closed South U.S. Highway 59 about 1:25 p.m. after receiving word of the incident and diverted traffic from the area, state patrol spokesperson Sarah Stewart said. The bridge, which crosses the Arkansas River where it enters the Robert S. Kerr Reservoir, will remain closed until it can be inspected, she said.

There were no reports of injuries on the highway or the barge, Stewart said.

It was not immediately known what caused the barge to hit the bridge.

The news came as engineers worked Saturday to lift a section of twisted steel from the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge in Maryland after it crumpled into the Patapsco River as a massive cargo ship crashed into one of its main supports.

  • Flying Squid
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    369 months ago

    The age of barges has begun. Humanity has a new enemy.

  • @jeffwM
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    259 months ago

    I imagine minor bridge collisions are quite common.

    • @[email protected]
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      9 months ago

      French here, yeah it kinda is. Or at least it’s rare but not exceptional I guess, at least for fluvial transport (barges and other similar types of ships)

      It’s usually not that bad, and at most requires some reinforcement of the bridge, or at least the removal of some parts of the ship that were embedded in the bridge example here in France.

        • @I_Miss_Daniel
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          29 months ago

          Must be client specific. It’s fine on Voyager.

        • @[email protected]
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          29 months ago

          Woops yeah, fixed it. I think some spacing between the parenthesis and the link would have also worked

    • @CaptainSpaceman
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      99 months ago

      If another bridge collapsed from a collision this soon after the FSK bridge, id be sus

      But yeah, this is just a “fender bender” it seems

    • @shalafi
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      19 months ago

      This is likely an “abundance of caution” thing.

  • Dem Bosain
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    149 months ago

    Is this what we’re doing to get our bridges fixed? We’re throwing boats at them?

  • SeaJ
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    139 months ago

    I’m sure some right winger is going to refer to Salisaw mayor Ernie Martens as a DEI mayor over this. /s