Sunshine Skyway Bridge

The Bob Graham Sunshine Skyway Bridge, known to locals as the Sunshine Skyway Bridge or more casually the Skyway, is a bridge spanning Tampa Bay, Florida, with a cable-stayed main span, and a total length of 21,877 feet (Four.1434 mi; 6.668 km). [7] It is part of Interstate two hundred seventy five (I-275) and U.S. Route nineteen (US Nineteen), connecting St. Petersburg in Pinellas County and Terra Ceia in Manatee County, Florida, passing through the waters of Pinellas County, Hillsborough County and Manatee County, Florida. Construction of the current bridge began in 1982, and the ended bridge was dedicated on February 7, 1987. The fresh bridge cost $244 million to build, and was opened to traffic on April 20, 1987. It substituted an older bridge constructed in 1954, which was partly demolished in a collision in 1980.

April 20, one thousand nine hundred eighty seven (fresh bridge)

It is constructed of steel and concrete. Steel cables clad in eighty four 9-inch (230 mm) steel tubes (42 per pylon) along the center line of the bridge support the main span. It was designed by the Figg & Muller Engineering Group (who also designed the popular Seven Mile Bridge), and built by the American Bridge Company.

In 2005, an act of the Florida Legislature officially named the current bridge the Bob Graham Sunshine Skyway Bridge, after the former Governor of Florida and then U.S. Senator who presided over its design and most of its construction. According to sources, he was inspired to suggest the current design by a visit to France, where he eyed a similar cable-stayed bridge, the Brotonne Bridge. The original bridge was dedicated to state engineer William E. Dean, as noted on a plaque displayed at the rest area at the south end of the bridge.

The Travel Channel rated the Sunshine Skyway number three in its special on the “Top ten Bridges” in the World. The bridge is considered the “flag bridge” of Florida. [8]

Because of its height above the emerald-green Gulf waters, length of continuous travel, location in a warm-weather state, and modern architectural design, it is a popular spot for filming automobile commercials.

A major problem with the Sunshine Skyway Bridge is corrosion of the steel in the precast concrete segmental columns on the high level approaches. Because the segments are hollow, workers were able to come in the bridge superstructure in two thousand three and two thousand four to reinforce the corroded sections of the bridge, ensuring its future safety. [8] Another problem arose around 2005–06 when several news bureaus reported paint discolorations on the bridge’s cables. These paint splotches and patches were a result of touch-ups that were performed over the years but began to showcase through over latest years. In 2008, the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) began an overhaul including repainting the cables in their entirety (instead of touching up) and rehabilitating the lighting system at the summit of the bridge. [9]

A two thousand fourteen FDOT probe noted that the Skyway’s low bridge clearance prevented larger vessels from using the Port Tampa Bay terminals, but made no recommendation about options as the air draft of most fresh cruise ships exceeds the bridge’s height limit at one hundred eighty feet (55 m). [Ten]

Contents

The present bridge substituted a steel cantilever bridge of the same name. The original two-lane bridge built by the Virginia Bridge Company was opened to traffic on September 6, 1954, [11] [12] with a similar structure built parallel and to the west of it in one thousand nine hundred sixty nine to make it a four-lane bridge and bring it to Interstate Highway standards. Opening of the newer span was delayed until one thousand nine hundred seventy one for reinforcing of the south main pier, which had cracked due to insufficient supporting pile depth. [13] The 2nd span was used for all southbound traffic, while the original span was converted to carry northbound traffic.

The old bridge substituted a ferry from Point Pinellas to Piney Point. US nineteen was extended from St. Petersburg to its current end north.

The remaining approaches to the old cantilever bridge remain in use as Skyway Fishing Pier State Park.

The original Sunshine Skyway Bridge was the site of a number of tragic events, including the collision of the US Coast Guard Cutter Blackthorn and inbound freighter Capricorn in one thousand nine hundred eighty which claimed twenty three Coast Guardsmen’s lives, [14] and a structural collapse caused by a collision with the bridge support by the inbound freighter Summit Venture in one thousand nine hundred eighty which killed thirty five people and ultimately ended the bridge spans’ useful life.

1980 collapse Edit

The southbound span (opened in 1971) of the original bridge was demolished at 7:33 a.m. on May 9, 1980, when the freighter MV Summit Venture collided with a pier (support column) during a dazzling thunderstorm, sending over 1,200 feet (370 m) of the bridge plummeting into Tampa Bay. The collision caused six cars, a truck, and a Greyhound bus to fall one hundred fifty feet (46 m) into the water, killing thirty five people. [15] [16]

One man, Wesley MacIntire, survived the fall when his Ford Courier pickup truck landed on the deck of the Summit Venture before falling into the bay. He sued the company that wielded the ship, and lodged for $175,000 in 1984. Mr. Macintire was the last person to drive on the original southbound span, and he died of bone cancer on October 14, one thousand nine hundred eighty nine at the age of 65. [17]

The pilot of the ship, John Lerro, was cleared of wrongdoing by both a state grand jury and a Coast Guard investigation. [Legal] Soon after the disaster, Lerro developed numerous sclerosis and died in two thousand two at the age of 59. [Nineteen]

The south main pier (the one that required reinforcement before completion) withstood the ship strike without significant harm. It was the 2nd pier to the south of it that was ruined, a secondary pier that was not designed to withstand a large ship strike. [13]

After the Summit Venture disaster, the southbound span was used as a makeshift fishing pier and the northbound span was converted back to carry one lane in either direction until the current bridge opened. Before the old bridge was demolished and hauled away in barges, MacIntire (the only survivor in the collapse) was the last person to drive over it. He was accompanied by his wifey, and when they reached the top of the bridge, they dropped thirty five white carnations into the water, one for each person who died in the disaster. [20] Both the main spans of both the intact northbound bridge and the bruised southbound bridge were demolished in one thousand nine hundred ninety three and the approaches for both old spans were made into the Skyway Fishing Pier State Park. These approaches sit one ⁄2 mile (800 m) to the south and west of the current bridge. The approaches of the one thousand nine hundred fifty span were demolished in 2008.

Gov. Graham’s idea for the design of the current bridge won out over other proposals, including a tunnel (deemed impractical due to Florida’s high water table) and a plain reconstruction of the violated section of the old bridge that would not have improved shipping conditions. The fresh bridge’s main span is 50% broader than the old bridge. The piers of the main span and the approaches for one ⁄4 mile (400 m) in either direction are surrounded by large concrete barriers, called “dolphins”, that can protect the bridge piers from collisions by ships larger than the Summit Venture like tankers, container ships, and cruise ships. [21]

1993 demolition Edit

In one thousand nine hundred ninety FDOT awarded the winning bid to the Hardaway Company to demolish all steel and concrete sections of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge. The scope of the project required that all underwater piles and piers, and surface roadway, girders, and slats be dismantled. Special care had to be taken in removing underwater bridge elements near the shipping channel. Additionally, the concrete material, deck sections, pilings and steel girders were to be collected in order to be placed offshore and along the remaining bridge approaches to become artificial reefs for the fresh planned state fishing park. The main bridge span had to be liquidated in one chunk in order not to block the main shipping tunnel leading to the Port of Tampa.

During the disassembly work of the bridges’ structural steel members, several difficult engineering challenges had to be resolved: the order of disassembly, a safe method for detonating charges on concrete and steel members in a publicly open and difficult to control area such as the Tampa Bay, and the development of a safe methodology for the removal in one lump of the bridge’s main span and concrete piers. [ citation needed ]

After extensive research, the engineering team developed a four × 1:16 ratio pulley system where each of the four corners of the span was connected to two 25-ton winches (bolted to the pavement of the deck). These winches managed the descent of the main 360-foot (110 m), 608-ton span to a barge anchored one hundred fifty feet (46 m) below. As part of the project design, the engineering team developed a real-time, computerized, synchronized descent calculator and control program to help each of the two winch management teams ensure that all winches were synchronized at the same thirty feet (9.1 m) per minute descent rate. The operation was executed successfully in two 1 ⁄2 hours despite adverse weather conditions. [22]

According to compilations from various media reports as of 2009, at least two hundred seven people have committed suicide by hopping from the center span into the waters of Tampa Bay since the opening of the fresh bridge in 1987, and an estimated thirty four others have attempted, but survived. A Rottweiler named Shasta survived after either following or being carried over the edge by its proprietor, who died. [23] Another fifty one people ended their lives from the old Sunshine Skyway from one thousand nine hundred fifty four to 1987. One man, 23-year-old Michael “Luciano” Plezia of Cleveland, was coerced to hop at gunpoint in 1981, after having been kidnapped, hammered, tantalized, and stabbed.; [24] [25] [26] [27] another, a 24-year-old Sarasota carpenter, hanged himself from the bridge on Saturday morning, July Four, 1992. [28] Several other missing persons are suspected of having hopped from the bridge, but their deaths could not be confirmed as no bods were recovered.

In response to the high number of suicide attempts from the bridge, the state of Florida installed six crisis hotline phones along the center span in 1999, and began 24-hour patrols. As of 2003, the call center at the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay received eighteen calls from potential jumpers, all of whom survived, according to a St. Petersburg Times report. [29] However, the total number of jumpers has not significantly declined since the introduction of these safeguards.

On April 27, 1997, a group of fledgling daredevils, led by bartender and stuntman Steve Trotter and composed of a mix of masculine and female participants, performed an unannounced guerrilla “pendulum sway” bungee leap off the bridge, wherein they planned to sway back and forward on a home-made bungee cord made of steel cable fastened to the cast-off point. Arriving by open up limousine, the group unexpectedly pulled over at the apex of the bridge, quickly rigged up their cable, tethered themselves to it with harnesses, and leaped over the edge. This stunt failed when the plastic sheathing on the steel cable, incapable to treat the increase in coerces exerted on it by the initial pendulum sway, sheared off and permitted the connecting clips to slide loosely off the cable, plunging the jumpers sixty feet (Legal m) into the water, leading to cracked bones and neck injuries. The entire accident was caught on numerous movie cameras that had been set up to record the feat. [30] [31]

When later interviewed for a television movie program, Trotter stated that all of the components were rated to treat the combined weight of the participants, and, at the time, he thought the assembly was safe. Later studies demonstrated that his design had failed to take into account the enhanced g-load caused by the pendulum act of the leap, exceeding the ratings on the components and leading to catastrophic failure of the structural integrity of the bungee cable. Since the accident, no other groups have attempted to perform a stunt leap from the bridge. This incident was broadcast on the television program Ruined in Seconds, on March Two, 2009.

In 2006, a feature film entitled Loren Cass was released, which depicted a suicide leap off the Sunshine Skyway. [32] Two years later, a 2nd filmmaker, Sean Michael Davis of Rhino Productions, was inspired by his haunting practice witnessing a woman leap off the bridge so quickly that no one could intervene, to create a non-for-profit film titled Skyway Down. His objectives: to deter other potential jumpers by ” ‘punch[ing] them in the face’ with interviews with survivors and family members”, [33] to give them “hope and to attempt to de-glorify the romanticism of the bridge”, [34] in part by informing those who have “mulled a leap to know about the bloody, battered aftermath.” [33]

Corporal Gary Schluter of the Florida State Highway Patrol — who has “seen the number of suicides, and attempts, climb steadily over the last few years” at the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, as well as persuaded numerous would-be suicides at that site to live — advises: “People look at that water and think it’s very serene, an effortless way to die . [but] . it’s more like hitting concrete.” As he and other troopers explained to The Fresh York Times reporter Rick Bragg, “Jumpers tend to die ugly. [. ] The fall, less than four seconds, finishes in a bone-snapping, organ-rupturing trauma, but some jumpers do not lose consciousness, and drown in agony.” Schluter elaborated: “We retrieve the bods. They are crooked, mangled.” [35]

On October 12, 2009, a bod was found in the trunk of a searing car on the Sunshine Skyway bridge. Witnesses spotted a man carrying a gasoline can near the car. A Florida Highway Patrol trooper later eyed the man hop from the bridge to his death. [36] After an investigation, authorities deemed the deaths a murder-suicide. The jumper, Robert Cecil Laird, shot his ex-wife, Sheryl Laird (39), numerous times at her home in Lakeland before depositing her figure in the vehicle’s trunk and driving approximately sixty miles (97 km) to the bridge, where he set the car afire and hopped to his death. [37]

Stopping on the bridge for any non-emergency, including sightseeing, is prohibited. As part of a controlled-access highway, pedestrians and bicycles are also prohibited. Traffic on the bridge is remotely monitored by the Florida Highway Patrol, and a stopped vehicle, bicyclist or a pedestrian will elicit a police dispatch. [38]

The original Sunshine Skyway Bridge is featured in the old-time radio series Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar in the scene “The Fancy Bridgework Matter” (November 22, 1959) and in the original opening credits to the one thousand nine hundred eighty eight Superboy television series, which showcased the hero flying over the bruised original span and then turning to view the fresh bridge under construction. The series tells the story about Superman in his college days as Superboy.

Sunshine Skyway Bridge has provided the setting for several films over the years, both credited and uncredited, e.g., Loren Cass and The Punisher

In Dennis Lehane’s one thousand nine hundred ninety seven novel Sacred, the Sunshine Skyway Bridge is the site of a car pursue and fatal accident, shortly after the main characters discuss the bridge’s “jinx.” [39]

In Ben Bova’s two thousand five novel Powersat, the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, along with the Brooklyn Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge were demolished in a coordinated terrorist attack against the United States. [40]

In 2012, the United States Postal Service featured the bridge on a US$Five.15 “Priority Mail” postage stamp. Carl T. Hermann painted it, and the digital illustration was created by artist Dan Cosgrove. [41]

Bill DeYoung’s two thousand thirteen non-fiction book, Skyway: The True Story of Tampa Bay’s Signature Bridge and the Man Who Brought it Down is a detailed chronicle of the one thousand nine hundred eighty Summit Venture tragedy and its aftermath. [42]

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