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-Land of the Free
A cargo ship has just EXPLODED in Baltimore Harbor in Maryland
2025-08-19


Newsweek adds:
An explosion rocked a fat merchantman near Baltimore Harbor Monday evening, sending emergency crews scrambling to respond near the same location where the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed last year.

The explosion near the Francis Scott Key Bridge site raises immediate maritime safety concerns in one of the East Coast's busiest shipping corridors.

Federal Sherlocks announced in March that the Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) failed to complete a crucial vulnerability assessment that could have identified the Francis Scott Key Bridge as being at high risk of collapse from a ship strike well before last year's disaster.

According to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the assessment, recommended decades ago, would have highlighted the structural dangers that ultimately led to the bridge's demise when a massive fat merchantman lost power, veered off course, and struck a support pier, killing six construction workers.

U.S. Coast Guard crews and firefighters from the city of Baltimore responded to the incident, successfully extinguishing the fire on the still-moving vessel, NBC News reported.

All 23 crew members aboard the vessel escaped injury in the dramatic incident that occurred around 6:30 p.m. ET, according to local station WBFF.

The W Sapphire, a 751-foot bulk carrier, experienced a fire and explosion while navigating the Patapsco River near the former bridge site. BCFD units responded immediately by both land and water, deploying specialized fireboats to assist the damaged vessel.

Despite the severity of the blast, the bulk carrier remained afloat throughout the incident and received critical assistance from tugboats to maintain stability in the busy shipping channel, WBFF reported.
More from Breitbart:
“The Baltimore City Fire Department reported that the ship caught fire in the Patapsco River near the site of the Key Bridge collapse.”

“While initial reports described it as an explosion, officials clarified that the incident involved an under-deck fire that sent smoke billowing into the air. The fire has since been contained, and the vessel is being removed from the channel. The cause of the fire remains under investigation,” it added.

According to Fox5DC, witness Jay Steinmetz said that “the name of the ship is the MV W Sapphire,” and VesselFinder described it as “a bulk carrier headed to Mauritius.”
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