Quebec officials say seaway bridges are safe after Baltimore disaster

Officials in Quebec say there are measures in place to prevent tragedies like the one in Baltimore on Tuesday after a cargo ship flattened the Francis Scott Key Bridge.

At least six people were presumed dead in the aftermath of the tragedy. Surveillance video showed the bridge completely collapse into the Patapsco River after the vessel struck one of the piers.

The St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation, which runs the shipping route from Montreal to Lake Erie, said it monitors marine traffic 24 hours a day and that the channels are safe "by design."

"We control the speed of vessels to make sure that the mass of these vessels coming down are under what we call a control zone, basically," said Jean Aubry-Morin, vice-president of external relations of the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation, in an interview with CJAD 800.

Marine inspectors also board vessels to inspect them regularly, he added.

Quebec's transport ministry, which is responsible for several bridges along the St. Lawrence Seaway, said the Canadian Coast Guard conducted a review in 1982 of the Laviolette bridge that links Trois-Rivieres and Bécancour. It was deemed to be the only bridge under the transport ministry's jurisdiction to be at risk of a collision with a commercial ship. As a result, a rock fill was added around the four bridge piers underneath the structure four years later.

"In case there would be a collision, the boat would hit the rocks and not the structure. And we're talking about a lot of rocks. At the surface when you look, it's about 25 metres around it, but when you go to the bottom it's about 100 metres surrounding the structure of a rock fill," said transport ministry spokesperson Louis-André Bertrand in an interview with CTV News. 

"So it's very safe."

A boat did run aground at the bridge in 1992 and there was no damage at all to the structure, he said.

"It's not a concern on our side," Bertrand said of the possibility of a collision. "A risk-free environment doesn't exist but everything is put in place to make maritime traffic as safe as possible."

• Listen on CJAD 800: Could something similar to the Baltimore Key Bridge collapse happen in Montreal?