1 Year Ago, Today.

At 6:05PM on August 1st 2007 a catastrophe hit Minnesota when the Interstate 35W Bridge spanning the Mississippi River suddenly collapsed. A critical artery that carried nearly 200,000 vehicles every day including over 6,000 commercial vehicles was instantly destroyed, killing 13 Minnesotans and injuring nearly 150 people.

A year ago today, pictures and videos of the disaster could be found on every news channel and website across the globe, pictures and videos of a disaster that hit so close to home. The collapse not only had an impact on the victims and their families but our metropolitan economy, transit systems, sporting events, even the upcoming 2008 Republican National Convention going on in Saint Paul next month, over a full year after the accident. The bridge collapse has launched full-fledged investigations into our nation’s bridges and infrastructure. It has given our country a heightened awareness of what structural deficiencies really mean and the potential catastrophic outcome if their not addressed.

My thoughts and sympathy go out to the victims and their families, and everyone else that was impacted in one way or another on that day. In this time of sorrow we can only be thankful that there was construction and lanes closed on the bridge making the potential number of causalities minimal, but devastating nonetheless.