And Now It's Oberstar's Turn
Yesterday, Senator Amy Klobuchar blamed the collapse of the I-35W bridge on a lack of highway funds -- even though the 2005 highway bill increased federal funding to Minnesota by 46% over its five-year span. Apparently realizing that line of argument wouldn't hold, Rep. James Oberstar accused MnDOT of being too cheap to use advanced technology for bridge inspections. He left out of his accusation that the technology hasn't proven itself for that purpose:
On the House floor Friday, U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar, D-Minn., accused MnDOT of turning down an opportunity to use a $200,000 high-tech inspection technology on the bridge that might have detected a fatal flaw. ..."Technology can discover microscopic cracks not visible to the naked eye and then measure their propagation and do the same with bridges," he said on the House floor. "The Minnesota Department of Transportation was offered the opportunity to use that technology and I am disappointed that the state rejected the opportunity to use that technology to test the structural integrity of the bridge that collapsed." ...
John Schadl, Oberstar's spokesman, said the congressman mentioned the incident because he is frustrated by the lack of investment in new technologies, at both the federal and state levels. But Oberstar does not know whether the company's system would have detected any fatal flaws in the bridge.
"Nobody knows if this technology would have prevented this tragedy," Schadl said.
Precisely. And do you know why nobody knows it? Because we don't know why the bridge failed yet. We don't know whether this system works as promised, either. Why can't our Democrats in this state wait to find out what actually happened before leaping to conclusions as to what could have prevented it -- especially on the floor of Congress?
We certainly know that the $200,000 price tag would not have busted the MnDOT highway budget, considering that Minnesota is receiving $3.5 billion from 2005 to 2009. MnDOT says they haven't even heard about this new system. If they had, the money exists for its use, assuming it actually works. Then we'd have to assume it would have identified the reason the bridge failed -- a reason we have not yet determined.
The rest of the story gets more detailed about the issue of MnDOT's decision to use aggressive inspections and spot repairs rather than installing steel plates on the support girders. The Strib insists that the decision was made on the basis of cost MnDOT still says that they had concerns about whether the drilling necessary for the comprehensive steel-plate installation would weaken the bridge too much, and repeats that although cost-benefit analyses are always a part of their decision-making processes, that wasn't the basis for this decision.
Even if they had decided to install steel plates, though, they wouldn't have started the project until next year. They would have spent this year designing that project and conducting the spot investigations until they were ready to move forward with it. Why? No one thought the bridge was in trouble; everyone believed it just needed more attention.
We need to have a clear understanding of why this bridge failed. When we do, then we can conduct whatever finger-pointing is supportable from the conclusion of a scientific process. If it becomes a political process, everyone will play CYA instead of determining the truth. Oberstar and Klobuchar are interfering with that determination, and Minnesotans need to tell them to pipe down until the NTSB can complete its investigation.
UPDATE: John Cole at Balloon Juice asks a great question -- "Since when is cost efficiency a bad thing?" Read the whole post.
Posted by Ed Morrissey on August 4, 2007 8:02 AM | Comments (27) | TrackBacks (1)
Comments (27)
Posted by Ken | August 4, 2007 8:32 AM
Watching Senator Amy on Fox yesterday, she blamed the war for costing so much and alluded to not spending that money at home on things like bridge repair. Essentially, she was blaming the White House for this disaster and in the next breath said it is too soon to point fingers.
Posted by negentropy | August 4, 2007 8:40 AM
This early in the investigation, the only thing that can be said for certain about the collapse is that it was caused by gravity. Everything else is dimwits with an axe to grind trying to score political points.
Posted by Wright | August 4, 2007 8:43 AM
And now the governor is saying that he may be willing to take another look at increasing the gasoline tax, even though it is quite clear that funding did not play any role in this tragic incident. This is just a CYA PR position. A pox on all politicians.
Posted by Continuum | August 4, 2007 9:00 AM
"Now, is not the time to point fingers." . . . . .
Famous Republican Saying When They Know They've Screwed Up
Posted by Dude | August 4, 2007 9:09 AM
About 15 years ago my cousin had developed technology similar to what is mentioned above. They were looking at exactly the problem of measuring fatigue of metal bridges. The company did receive several rounds of funding but never did get a product out the door. The dotcom boom came along and interest in it dried up. Last I heard, about '98 or '99, some of the people were trying to buy up the patents and were going to try and make another run at it. I would wager whoever does own them is scrambling right now. There would be a few years left on them.
Posted by Keemo | August 4, 2007 9:10 AM
CE,
"Now, is not the time to point fingers." . . . . .
Famous Republican Saying When They Know They've Screwed Up
Posted by: Continuum at August 4, 2007 9:00 AM
Isn't one of the requirements for posting comments here at CQ, that an IQ of 100 or higher is mandatory? This Contunuum creature simply doesn't meet the minimum requirement for posting... (sarcasm)
Posted by Continuum | August 4, 2007 9:17 AM
Keemo, thanks for the quote.
It doubles the exposure of the original thought.
BTW - If you have to tell people you're being sarcastic, then you're not.
Posted by patrick neid | August 4, 2007 9:22 AM
with the way this accident is going thank god there were no muslim taxi drivers on that bridge......
Posted by Andrew X | August 4, 2007 9:26 AM
Wow, continuum, you're right! I am now TWICE as likely to accept your pearls of wisdom regarding the cause of ALL, repeat ALL bad stuff in the world, as I was when I was only halfway down the page! Amazing!
Wait a minute..... now I'm THREE times more enlightened by it! Ahhhhhhh!!! Make it stop!! My head can't handle the sequentially growing genuis !
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ...... (fade to black)
Posted by KathyP | August 4, 2007 9:29 AM
There's an old saying in the manufacturing world - 'you can't inspect in quality.' True that until we know how the bridge failed, coulda/woulda/shoulda is just useless wasting of air.
Posted by Continuum | August 4, 2007 9:29 AM
"You're doin' a heck of a job Brownie . . . . errrrr . . . .Andy.X"
ROFLMAO
Posted by Charles | August 4, 2007 9:31 AM
When hired expertise proposes a solution, and the proposed solution is rejected, but another solution is accepted, for reasons that they can't seem to spell out, which "coincidentally" has the lowest cost, we are all entitled to suspect the "it wasn't the cost" statement is just CYA.
Or you can believe it. Your choice.
Bottom line is that there is no absolute safety on the road (or, in this case, under it) and building and maintaining bridges always a compromise between cost and safety. They could just say that, if they weren't politicians and bureaucrats.
Posted by JeanneB | August 4, 2007 9:39 AM
I read the Trib's article about the engineering survey that recommended reinforcing the bridge.
MnDOT CHOSE 'MOST COST EFFECIENT' OF 3 OPTIONS
http://www.startribune.com/462/story/1343671.html
Nutshell: MnDot pays engineers to do study. Engineers recommend costly plating. MnDot "consults" w/ engineers for 6 months. Engineers then suggest THREE solutions, one of which is the 'most cost efficient' inspections.
Think about that. It's a chicken/hen house thing. There should be an independent board reviewing such decisions. The consultants are reporting directly to the department who's budget will be impacted.
I read this and thought about the standard auditing practices in the corporate world. Auditors don't report to the department being audited. They report to an independent committee of the board of directors. If a priority (like safety) is getting short shrift, auditors bring it to the attention of the audit committee or (in many cases) the safety committee of the board of directors. Don't laugh. I've served as V.P. of a large company and these committees take these reports seriously. They don't take kindly to a division that gets a poor audit report...they act quickly. (Of course, once the report is in their hands, they can't afford to NOT act...the media attention if something happened---after they were given notice---well, no director wants that.).
Having MnDot order the survey, receive its results, and then decide whether to follow them---that turns out to be a recipe for disaster. Perhaps states should establish INDEPENDENT Safety Agencies to receive all engineering surveys and oversee resulting decisions. If THEY are the ones who's butts will be on the line, they just might put safety above budgets. But, sigh, this is government. There's no reason to think the "agency" wouldn't just collect their paychecks while mouthing whatever MnDot wanted.
Posted by J | August 4, 2007 9:46 AM
Life is not "risk free" but as a nation we seem to have reached the point that we should suffer no accidents, pain, hurt, etc. and if something does go wrong, there is always someone/thing else to blame. There is NO WAY anything can be 100% guaranteed to do _______. There will always be at least two sides, politicians, human error and Mother Nature's unpredictable hiccups.
Unfortunately the dhimmi Dems want to control everyone and everything through nanny laws, taxes, and impose only their view of the world (blame someone but not them). This is why they make so many of their inane comments in Congress. I am in favor of investigations but playing the blame game is just posturing by the press and politicos.
Posted by starfleet_dude | August 4, 2007 10:00 AM
We need to have a clear understanding of why this bridge failed. When we do, then we can conduct whatever finger-pointing is supportable from the conclusion of a scientific process. If it becomes a political process, everyone will play CYA instead of determining the truth. Oberstar and Klobuchar are interfering with that determination, and Minnesotans need to tell them to pipe down until the NTSB can complete its investigation.
Ed, the bridge fell because of a structural failure. As one engineer put it, it could have fallen at any time once the steel had been flexed enough, which it obviously was. MN-DoT was monitoring the condition of the bridge but did not have the funds at hand to consider replacing it yet. The cost-benefit calculations are affected by the level of overall funding too, and there are other problem bridges in the metro area, most notably the Lafayette Bridge in St. Paul, that deserve to have their replacement pushed up rather than put off due to a lack of funds. We don't need to have a "clear understanding" of the particular cause of the failure of the collapse of the 35W bridge to realize it's time to deal with the backlog of transportation maintenance in the state, and that raising the fuel tax is necessary to fund it. Thankfully, Governor Pawlenty is relenting on his no-tax pledge, as well he should. But it's sad it takes such a terrible event to move him on this issue, when there was already a bipartisan consensus in the Legislature to increase funding to meet the state's needs.
Posted by Bob Smith | August 4, 2007 10:15 AM
Why is Pawlenty relenting on his no-tax pledge? Money is not the problem. Stupid spending is the problem. Start by dropping the billion-plus dollar trolley they want to construct and use that on road maintenance. Of course that wouldn't comport with the liberal meme that cars are evil and are destroying the planet, so they'll raise taxes instead.
Posted by patrick neid | August 4, 2007 10:24 AM
" We don't need to have a "clear understanding" of the particular cause of the failure of the collapse of the 35W bridge to realize it's time to deal with the backlog of transportation maintenance in the state, and that raising the fuel tax is necessary to fund it. Thankfully, Governor Pawlenty is relenting on his no-tax pledge, as well he should. But it's sad it takes such a terrible event to move him on this issue, when there was already a bipartisan consensus in the Legislature to increase funding to meet the state's needs."
what a bunch of tripe. the state has had the money on numerous occasions. they made decisions to spend it other places. acting or implying that funding or the lack thereof had anything to do with this ACCIDENT is standard nanny state bunk. accidents happen, get over it. people make informed decisions and sometimes they are wrong. the last thing to do is throw money at this.
the best thing to do would be to review the decision making process within the confines of existing funding--not expand the funding while keeping possibly poor decision making in place.
progressives=socialist=communists always want to use every opportunity to increase the size of the STATE usually through taxing and spending. Katrina was there last dream come true.
Posted by Continuum | August 4, 2007 10:45 AM
Reason why Dems are raising twice as much money as the Republicans . . . .
"progressives=socialist=communists always want to use every opportunity to increase the size of the STATE usually through taxing and spending. . . . "
Now, only the neocon Republicans believe their own lies . . . . the rest of the country has moved on.
The majority of Americans recognize the neocon Republican corruption in your thoughts and deeds and philosophy.
The emperor has no clothes and Ameicans know it.
Happy November 2008.
Posted by pk | August 4, 2007 10:48 AM
they paint those bridges with pretty thick paint in order to stop corrosion.
there is a possibility that the initial cracks were small enough that they would not have disturbred the paint enough to be visible to the eye.
two things from metalurgy class in the early 70's:
one is that cracks propagate (once formed) at very high speed.
the other is that low alloy high strength (LAHS) steels, read structural steels, have high ductility and fail relatively slowly.
C
Posted by patrick neid | August 4, 2007 3:30 PM
your delusions continue, continuum.
the country is equally divided. as to dems giving more money now? that's because they are idiots. repubs wait until the nominee is basically decided on and then they respond.
let's see. by the end of 2008 the dems will have occupied the white house 12 of the last 40 years. i wonder why that is? if Giuliani is the repub nominee it will then be 12 of the last 48 years. hmmmm. must be because
progressive = socialist = communist =
stalinist = lennist = marxist. it's a very accurate, simple formula time tested over the last 100 years.
Posted by Ray | August 4, 2007 5:56 PM
"Ed, the bridge fell because of a structural failure."
No kidding! The question is: What caused that structural failure?
Posted by docjim505 | August 4, 2007 6:19 PM
Can anybody, anywhere, point to a single piece of legislation, executive order, or anything else that WOULD have ordered an inspection / overhaul of the bridge that got cancelled for lack of funds? If not, STFU.
We're being asked by the libs to believe that, if ONLY they'd had just a teensy-weensy little bit more money, they would have spent it on THAT bridge (cross their hearts!) and this wouldn't have happened. No way would the extra tax revenue that Pawlenty (the bastard!) nixed have been spent on a basket weaving museum or other porkbarrel.
My job is quality control / inspection. A few things you learn in the biz:
1. You can never, ever guarantee that your inspection will catch all the potential problems. We don't have a Star Trek tricorder that, by measuring the rate of inverse tachyon decay, will tell us that a piece of steel will fail in 48.324 hours. Further, no matter how hard you try, acts of God can and do occur.
2. There's always a balance between "quality" / safety and use. The state apparently made a decision that they had better things to spend their money on than more inspections and repairs. Ooops.
3. Quality / safety people are by nature and position alarmists and look for problems. Part of this is the nature of our work (when you spend all day looking for problems, you inevitably find them), and part is due to the fact that we know our asses are on the line if anything goes wrong down the road. Therefore, I won't be surprised to find that some inspectors reported problems with the bridge before it collapsed.
Unfortunately, decision-makers and not quite as fanatical about quality / safety. For one thing, they get tired of listening to alarmists. More importantly, however, they have to deal with the real consequences of erring on the side of caution. "You want to shut down a major bridge for weeks if not months because you THINK there MIGHT be a structural problem?"
4. Hindsight is 20/20; it's easy after things go KA-BOOM to think about what somebody else SHOULD have done. "Well, why didn't you run ____ test? Why didn't you use ____ equipment? Why didn't you run the test in triplicate? In quintuplicate?"
A final question:
Does anybody really think that ANY of the officials involved in making decisions about the bridge prior to the accident wouldn't have moved heaven and earth to keep it from collapsing if they had KNOWN it was that unsafe?
Posted by poodlemom | August 4, 2007 8:54 PM
In the grand scheme of things, do the Twins REALLY need that new stadium? The 500+ million raised & committed to the new facility would have gone a long way to pay for a new bridge.
Ed, during the initial news reports it was mentioned that the Twins had postponed the ground breaking for the new facility. Where will the new facility be located and will fans be able to get there easily without the 35W span?
Posted by starfleet_dude | August 4, 2007 10:38 PM
Ray, think of the bridge as a spoon that's been bent numerous times over the years. At some point one bend breaks it. Simply focusing on the cause of that last final bend misses the fact that it wasn't the cause but was just the last straw that broke the camel's back.
Posted by Ron K | August 4, 2007 10:39 PM
Patrick - I agree with your "progressives=socialist=communists" statement.
it will be interesting to see what they come up with a reason for the failure, it could be something other than the fatigue failure everyone seems to think. If you look at the NYS Thruway bridge that collapsed, it was only about 30 years old when it did, the cause was erosion around one of the supports. if this is the case and I say if, will the people sounding off about Bush apologize for their statements.
Posted by Artie Curtis | August 5, 2007 7:57 AM
So which technology companies does Oberstar have a stake in that he wants Minnesota to invest in?
Posted by Ray | August 5, 2007 7:06 PM
starfleet_dude,
Your describing metal fatigue and that could very well be a cause, but that hasn't been determined yet.
Simple stating that a bridge collapsed because the structure failed doesn't tell us anything useful. You could just as easily say that a airplane crashed because of a lack of lift but that doesn't tells us what actually caused that crash.
The reasons for investigating the cause of this collapse is not to affix blame, it is to discover the actual events and conditions that lead to that collapse and that discovery will be used as an aid in which to develop better materials and procedures to ensure that this type of collapse doesn't occur in the future.