Baltimore Key Bridge collapse: Temporary channel opens for boats working on bridge response

A hazmat investigator looked into the cargo on the container ship and identified 56 containers of hazardous materials, National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said Wednesday evening.

The 56 containers hold 764 tons of hazardous materials that include "mostly corrosives, flammables, and miscellaneous Class 9 hazardous materials, which would include lithium-ion batteries," Homendy said.

Some of the hazmat containers had been "breached," and there has been "sheen" seen on the waterway, which state and local authorities are aware of and investigating, according to officials.

Homendy said it wasn't known how many hazardous containers were in the water after the incident.

There were 23 people aboard Dali at the time of the collision, 21 crew members and two pilots, according to the NTSB chair.

During the briefing, Homedy said the data recorders they have access to are considered basic compared to a commercial plane.

The ship's voice data recorder only captured limited information, she said.

The U.S. Coast Guard provided the NTSB with six hours of data between midnight and 6 a.m. ET upon arrival.

Officials said on Wednesday that the quality of audio from the box "varies wildly" because of the high level of background noise, which will have to be filtered out to improve the audio quality.

They expect to recover 30 days of data from the data recorders, she said.

Addressing the collision, the NTSB said that current data points to a power failure, but they have not confirmed that or a possible reason for the likely power failure.

Two bodies were recovered from a red pickup truck found in the water near the middle span of the bridge, Maryland State Police said during a press briefing.

The two men were located by divers shortly before 10 a.m. Wednesday, according to Roland Butler Jr., superintendent for Maryland State Police. The truck was submerged in approximately 25 feet of water, he said.

The victims were identified by police as Alejandro Hernandez Fuentes, 35, a native of Mexico who lived in Baltimore, and Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera, 26, a native of Guatemala who lived in Dundalk. They were both construction workers, authorities said.

One was identified by a driver's license in his pocket and the other by fingerprint, authorities said.

Four other construction workers are presumed dead following the collapse, authorities said, as the search transitioned to a recovery effort on Wednesday.

A survivor who was hospitalized following the collapse was released earlier Wednesday, police said.

Officials said during a press briefing Wednesday that reopening the Port of Baltimore is a "top priority."

Gov. Wes Moore said Maryland has submitted a request to the Biden administration today asking for emergency relief funds "to assist in our work going forward" as the Port of Baltimore remains closed following the bridge collapse.

Moore told reporters during a press briefing that he does not yet know what the total costs or the full timeline will be.

"Despite this task ahead of us being daunting, I can tell you right now our resolve is unshaken. We will get to completion," he said.

Some 8,000 workers on the docks are impacted by the bridge collapse, the governor said.

"We need to make sure that we're getting them back on the job -- and the same goes for many others that have been affected by this crisis, both directly and indirectly," Moore said.

Maryland Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen also reiterated during the briefing that getting the shipping lanes open is an urgent priority.

At 1 a.m., the 984-foot-long, Singapore-flagged cargo ship pulled out of its berth at the Dundalk Marine Terminal, southeast of downtown Baltimore, and started to head up the Patapsco River toward the Francis Scott Key Bridge, according to the vessel's tracking data.

At 1:23 a.m., a livestream camera captured the massive ship coming into view as it approached the Key Bridge, apparently on course to pass under the 1.6-mile-long span near the middle of the bridge's cantilevered section. The footage showed light traffic on the bridge, including a tractor-trailer rig.

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