FMCSA Issues State of Emergency for Baltimore Bridge Collapse

You probably saw this coming from a mile away, but the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is declaring a State of Emergency in direct response to the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore.

Details

The Declaration provides relief from 49 CFR § 395.3 of federal regulations, which is the maximum driving time done in a day. The Declaration applies to transportation that relates to one of three different categories:

• Transportation related to the immediate restoration of essential services at the Port of Baltimore.
• Transportation of commodities re-routed due to the disruptions to vessel traffic into the Port, subject to the restrictions and conditions set forth in this Extension.
• Transportation of fuel (gasoline, ethanol, propane, natural gas, and heating oil) from Maryland’s Curtis Bay terminal (within the Baltimore Marine Terminal area) for delivery to the following locations within Maryland: Anne Arundel, Baltimore City, Baltimore County, Carroll County, Cecil County, Frederick County, Harford County, Howard County, Queen Anne’s County, and Washington County.

As such, the purpose of the Declaration is not only to get the Francis Scott Key Bridge up and running again as soon as possible, but also to mitigate the downsides of having a broken bridge.

As to be expected with temporary suspensions of hours-of-service regulations, should a driver exceed the normal time, they are allowed to continue until the job is done (except for bullet point number two, commodities, which is an extension of only two hours), and then the driver must take a break that lasts a minimum of ten consecutive hours.

Conclusion

As of the time of writing, there is no set timeline for when the Francis Scott Key Bridge will be up and running. There are stories of other bridges being repaired in record time when the situation calls for it, but few (if any) have been as big as the Francis Scott Key Bridge, a four-lane bridge spanning around 1.6 miles. It may take some time before it is back into normal operation, and as such it is likely this Declaration will be extended beyond its current May 4th expiration date.

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