The $550 ticket was issued in May and — we assume — has been paid.
But the Washington State Patrol hadn’t released its final report in the May 23, 2013, I-5 Skagit River bridge collapse until Monday.
The State Patrol report notes that the driver of the truck was permitted to carry a load no taller than 15 feet, 9 inches. Following the accident the load was measured at 15 feet, 11 inches. The lowest clearance for the bridge’s outer lanes was 14 feet, 7 inches. The load struck 11 sway braces as the truck crossed the bridge, causing a section of it to collapse and sending two vehicles into the river. The State Patrol also said there was not adequate distance between the truck and the pilot car, and the pilot car driver was distracted by a phone call to the truck driver. Fortunately, there were no fatalities that day.
But the collapse was much more than an inconvenience of detours for residents and businesses in Skagit and Snohomish and other counties in the region, even considering an emergency bridge was in place less than a month later and a permanent replacement was opened that September at a cost of $17 million.
The State Patrol report was limited in scope to its jurisdiction in the matter. A report in July by the National Transportation Safety Board was more inclusive, finding “multiple gaps in multiple systems,” specifically faulting not only the truck driver and his pilot, but the state’s self-policed system for permitting of over-height truck loads and a lack of adequate signage of height limits on bridges and underpasses.
There has been no change in how the state Department of Transportation issues such permits. Trucking companies go to a website, review the bridge clearances and other limitations on their planned route and are issued a permit that is not reviewed by any state employee.
A bill proposed in the Legislature shortly after the bridge collapse by a Spokane senator would have prohibited permitting of loads that exceed the minimum clearance of any bridge on a load’s route — in effect requiring it to detour around potential problems — and would have required signs on any bridge with less than 16 feet of clearance. The bill got as far as the Senate Transportation committee this year but no further.
Certainly the trucking industry has better options, including commercial GPS systems that include information on bridge clearances and alert drivers well in advance of trouble ahead. But there is no requirement by the state Department of Transportation that such a system be used.
The federal government provided 100 percent funding for the emergency span and 90 percent for the permanent, and the state is filing a claim with the trucking company’s insurance firm and says it will litigate if necessary.
Good, but that leaves us with a host of bridges that, like the I-5 Skagit River bridge, are considered by the state to be “functionally obsolete” and possibly unable able to withstand the next strike by a load two inches over.
We can’t continue to rely on trucking companies’ self-compliance to ensure our safety. And a $550 fine doesn’t begin to cover our losses.
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