All summer long, I’ve been bemused at the lack of real news that’s been making for some really strange cable news coverage… particularly on the daytime shows. We got to see coverage of a horse rescue from a canyon in California, several local Southern CA car chases, and lots about missing women from more than one Midwestern state. But, as my coworkers were often to point out, at least it means that there’s nothing really bad happening in the country as a whole, if they’re covering this stuff.
Which came back to haunt me as I watched the sad aftermath of the fallen bridge in Minneapolis, today at work. I’m glad that the body count got revised downward–for the scale of the damage you see in the pictures, it’s amazing that (so far) they’ve only confirmed 4 dead. Good work by police and the people who were unharmed but part of the disaster, I think, helped the worst of the injured get speedily dispatched to hospitals where they could be treated. I’m glad to live in a country where we can work together like that.
I’ve got to admit that I wondered if it was terrorist activity. They said so early on that they’d ruled out the possibility it was caused by terrorists… which probably meant that it was evident that the collapse wasn’t caused by explosions or such. But what if they’d gotten wiser and did some behind-the-scenes sabotage that made this happen? I know, I know, I watch too many forensic TV shows…
It’s troubling to think that our aging interstate infrastructure could lead to more events like this one. Though more likely, with this tragedy as a stark reminder of what can happen when you neglect proper maintenance of bridges, there will be a spate of highway bridge revamping across the country that will keep road construction workers happily employed for the next decade or so. And then the next unforeseen disaster will hit–maybe sewer lines or water mains or something–and we’ll have that brought to our national attention.
I hope that we’ve seen the worst to date, and that the recovery efforts that go on from here won’t turn up unexpected horrors. (I’ve got to admit, too, that I’m curious what all the regular I-35 commuters are going to do now that the interstate is down? What will that do to the city’s traffic patterns which, I’d assume, are as congested and frustrating as any other major metropolitan area’s?)
Posted by Kjirstin 
