Phoenix520 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 19, 2021 2:24 pm
I’m going to go all classist here. Manchin comes from what could be an amazing place if not for all the bosses trying to kill the workers and citizens of West Virginia. He’s white trash compared to most of the other Senators and he knows it.
Coal is King in WV. Coal has been killing his people for hundreds of years but all the people I’ve met in the coal belt think they’re lucky to have jobs at all and coal is cool. Because that’s what they’ve been told for generations, even as their fathers lay dying of black lung. Manchin did nothing to protect the state from table top mining, strip mining, fracking in any of his positions of power. He and the other families who form the power networks in the state are just like Manchin… protect each other at all costs, laws don’t apply to us, do whatever it takes. Manchin’s daughter flaked her way out of college and into a degree anyway, thanks to the network.
He’s paying us back in that white trash way he do. He truly doesn’t care.
Absolutely right!
I have one family in my overall family that were coal miners. Even though her father died young of black lung disease, she's as gung ho on coal as you can get. Her father mined in PA, not WV, but it doesn't matter. That's the mindset.
Phoenix520 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 19, 2021 2:24 pm
I’m going to go all classist here. Manchin comes from what could be an amazing place if not for all the bosses trying to kill the workers and citizens of West Virginia. He’s white trash compared to most of the other Senators and he knows it.
Coal is King in WV. Coal has been killing his people for hundreds of years but all the people I’ve met in the coal belt think they’re lucky to have jobs at all and coal is cool. Because that’s what they’ve been told for generations, even as their fathers lay dying of black lung. Manchin did nothing to protect the state from table top mining, strip mining, fracking in any of his positions of power. He and the other families who form the power networks in the state are just like Manchin… protect each other at all costs, laws don’t apply to us, do whatever it takes. Manchin’s daughter flaked her way out of college and into a degree anyway, thanks to the network.
He’s paying us back in that white trash way he do. He truly doesn’t care.
Absolutely right!
I have one family in my overall family that were coal miners. Even though her father died young of black lung disease, she's as gung ho on coal as you can get. Her father mined in PA, not WV, but it doesn't matter. That's the mindset.
2016 story but relevant:
"The more I talk, the more I get out of breath"
Mackie Branham, 39, of Elkhorn Creek, Ky., spent 19 years mining coal until he was diagnosed with complicated black lung. He ran monstrous mining machines and drilled bolts into mine roofs — occupations NIOSH says can involve excessive mine dust exposure. He worked double shifts and seven-day weeks every chance he had.
His gallbladder was removed one day and he says he was back at work the next. He took two days, he says, after knee surgery, before working a 12-hour shift drilling bolts. But severe breathing problems forced him to leave work in March. And he struggles for every breath now.
"My dad has got it. Everybody that has got it, got it when they had like first stage or so. I'll probably be the first born to be this bad in the family," Branham says, describing a family legacy of black lung.
"They can't breathe but they can still get up and walk around and do stuff. The more I talk, the more I get out of breath. It's like I ain't got no capacity."
...
In Kentucky, Mackie Branham has more immediate concerns. He heard this week he'll be getting state black lung benefits soon. He is hoping the first check arrives before Christmas so he can buy presents for his five children.
He is also left gasping for air and grasping for words. He worked hard to feed his family and now, as his life leaves him one breath at a time, he wonders about the cost.
Branham has "never been scared of death," he says, as he chokes back tears. "It don't bother me a bit. It's just not seeing my kids grow up. But if I had it to do over I would do it again, if that's what it took to provide for my family as long as I have."
Branham hopes for a lung transplant, which may give him five to 10 more years of life.
I can't remember if this was the fellow who said he'd go back to mining if he had a double lung transplant.
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – Ten people suffered minor injuries after a bridge collapsed in Point Breeze early Friday morning.
Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire Chief Darryl Jones told reporters just after 8:30 a.m. that 10 people were injured, three of whom were taken to hospitals. None of the injuries was life-threatening, Jones said.
According to Pittsburgh Public Safety, crews were called to the scene in the area of Forbes and Braddock before 7 a.m. Friday.
Several cars as well as a Port Authority bus were involved in the collapse. The three people who were taken to hospitals all were on the bus at the time of the collapse, Jones said.
“It sounded like a huge snow plow … pushing along the surface with no snow,” neighbor Wendy Stroh said. “I didn’t know what it was … It was very frightening.”
And
Just hours before President Joe Biden’s scheduled speech in Pittsburgh about the historic $1.2 trillion infrastructure plan, Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey said the bridge over Hot Dog Dam Dog Park was inspected just last September.
Biden was made aware of the collapse and has been in touch with state and local officials, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said on Twitter.
This is a major artery in the city. It happened early enough in the morning that traffic was not high. An hour our later, there would have been a lot of rush-hour traffic on the bridge.
This is in the east end of Pittsburgh. Forbes Avenue is one of the major arteries from Downtown Pittsburgh to the East End. Here, it cuts through a major park. There is a walking/running trail beneath the bridge. Probably the bad weather kept people off the trail at 6:45 AM this morning, but I guess it will take some time to figure if it's possible that anyone could be trapped under the bridge. I would think it's unlikely. In addition to Forbes Avenue being a major road, Frick Park is one of the jewels of the Pittsburgh Public Park Systems. My daughter's family goes there often.
There was a gas line under the bridge, and the odor of mercaptan was strong.
This is going to be a mess for months, and probably years, to come.
Edited to add: There was a two-hour delay for schools this morning because of snow. That kept the traffic down considerably.
No link yet, but reports are that Biden will now add a trip to the site of the bridge collapse. He's flying into the County Airport, a smaller airport closer to where his original speech was to be given. Cross town it would be a fairly long drive, so maybe helicopter?
This is the best photo I've found so far that gives a good overview. They used a human chain to get the people out of the bus. The bridge has been considered in poor condition. It met minimal standards to stay in service.
They have brought in search dogs to sure that no one is trapped.
The entirety of Frick Park's 664 acres has been closed to the public. They are mostly just trying to keep gawkers away from the collapsed Fern Hollow Bridge site.
In case anyone is interested... Here is a Google Maps street view of the bridge from the hiking trail in the park below. You should be able to move along the trail by clicking and rotate the view by dragging.
Biden flew into the County Airport instead of the International Airport, so he landed only about three miles from the bridge collapse. It was much easier to get there from the County Airport (only a few miles from me). He didn't make any formal remarks, but he will probably say something at his scheduled stop.
Living here, in the City of Bridges, we take our bridges, and, unfortunately the often bad conditions of them, very seriously. There are nearly 1,300 bridges in the county; 123 of them are listed in poor condition, as was the Fern Hollow Bridge. There isn't any direction from my house where I don't have to cross a bridge in less than a mile. We are so used to them here, we mostly don't even notice. Many are barely noticeable as there are so many creeks, but there are lots of hills, rivers, and ravines, so many of them are like the one that just collapsed this morning.
It's amazing that this happened when it did, with so many factors that kept anyone from being killed. There are now four people in the hospital, all in fair condition. But this was a heavily-used bridge on a major route through the city, and a lot of people live right around it, so it's going to be a major headache in so many ways for so many people, probably for years to come.
This is the best photo I've found so far that gives a good overview. They used a human chain to get the people out of the bus. The bridge has been considered in poor condition. It met minimal standards to stay in service.
They have brought in search dogs to sure that no one is trapped.
Pa. fuel tax meant for bridge repair went to state police instead
By Katie Meyer April 26, 2019
In theory, Pennsylvania could be spending billions more to update aging roads and bridges.
But instead, the money is being rerouted to help fund State Police operations. The convoluted funding scheme has long been criticized by Harrisburg. But a new audit has given a more detailed picture of where the money is going.
Pennsylvania has almost 3,000 bridges classified as structurally deficient, though state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale said Thursday that tally has actually been halved since 2008.
Over six years, $4.2 billion that could have helped fix those bridges has instead gone to State Police, he said.
Pa. fuel tax meant for bridge repair went to state police instead
By Katie Meyer April 26, 2019
In theory, Pennsylvania could be spending billions more to update aging roads and bridges.
But instead, the money is being rerouted to help fund State Police operations. The convoluted funding scheme has long been criticized by Harrisburg. But a new audit has given a more detailed picture of where the money is going.
Pennsylvania has almost 3,000 bridges classified as structurally deficient, though state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale said Thursday that tally has actually been halved since 2008.
Over six years, $4.2 billion that could have helped fix those bridges has instead gone to State Police, he said.
I crossed that bridge numerous times via bus, and at least once by foot (well, twice, if you count the return trip) when I was attending Carnegie Mellon. I believe I was going to Edgewood most of those times (there was a mall there, once, if I recall - it's been 25 years, so I could be thinking of something else). Frick is a lovely park, though Schenley was my preferred park to explore, due to bordering campus and providing an alternate route to Pitt and downtown.
Looking at it the bridge fell flat rather than turning as it fell, so that would have encouraged cares to remain upright rather than turn over. That probably helped with the (relative) lack of injuries.
I'm not an engineer, but from my visualising of the accident, it would have taken a total failure of the bridge from one side to the other to cause a pancake fall like that. Basically the bridge cracked on the left to right side of the road almost instantly so it came down together without rolling.
I've been over it many times, too, but not recently. My daughter lives in Morningside, so it's a route they use often. As you will understand, detouring around something like that here is not like in other places. I have no idea where they will detour, but I think the Squirrel Hill Tunnel is going to get a lot more use, which is going to be ugly. Yes, people still slow down.* I think there are three public schools within blocks of the ex-bridge. Our Lt. Governor, John Fetterman, lives about a mile from that bridge. He was there almost immediately.
*I know that's common for tunnels, but there is something about the Squirrel Hill Tunnel that brings out the worst in people, probably the on and off ramps right at the Squirrel Hill side entrance.
Suranis wrote: ↑Sat Jan 29, 2022 12:35 pm
Damn. Thank God no-obe was killed.
Looking at it the bridge fell flat rather than turning as it fell, so that would have encouraged cares to remain upright rather than turn over. That probably helped with the (relative) lack of injuries.
I'm not an engineer, but from my visualising of the accident, it would have taken a total failure of the bridge from one side to the other to cause a pancake fall like that. Basically the bridge cracked on the left to right side of the road almost instantly so it came down together without rolling.
Having looked at the underbridge structure from the Google maps link, plus the post collapse picture, here is my reconstruction of the collapse (as seen from the perspective of the photographer of the collapsed photo):
The near right support leg buckles
The bridge sags to the right, causing a vertical shear on the right connection and a horizontal shear on the left connection
The near left support leg collapses to the right, mostly leveling the bridge section as it collapses, with displacement to the right
The far supports, designed for compression, are now in tension as the bridge section starts pulling on the other sections and collapse primarily toward the viewer, with some displacement to the right
The first bridge section lands mostly flat and starts sliding downhill, submarining under the next section
The sections on the far side, being the last to fall, have the previous sections preventing them from sliding, so simply pancake with some displacement to the right
I've been over it many times, too, but not recently. My daughter lives in Morningside, so it's a route they use often. As you will understand, detouring around something like that here is not like in other places. I have no idea where they will detour, but I think the Squirrel Hill Tunnel is going to get a lot more use, which is going to be ugly. Yes, people still slow down.* I think there are three public schools within blocks of the ex-bridge. Our Lt. Governor, John Fetterman, lives about a mile from that bridge. He was there almost immediately.
*I know that's common for tunnels, but there is something about the Squirrel Hill Tunnel that brings out the worst in people, probably the on and off ramps right at the Squirrel Hill side entrance.
I'd probably be looking at Penn to 5th, maybe cutting over to Forbes on Shady or Dallas. But I have only driven that a few times, so I don't have a good concept of what that traffic would be like. But yeah, would avoid Squill Tunnel like the plague for the next few months.
Manu Raju @mkraju wrote:
Sen. Joe Manchin, asked about Build Back Better, said: “What Build Back Better bill? I don’t know what you guys are talking about.”
I asked him if he’s had any talks on the matter since December. “No, no, no, no. It’s dead.”
Here's an engineering reconstruction of what might have happened. Not terribly for off from what I described, but the collapse started at the far end and the near end supports didn't collapse, which is why the road buckled like it did.
W. Kevin Vicklund wrote: ↑Wed Feb 02, 2022 3:09 pm
Here's an engineering reconstruction of what might have happened. Not terribly for off from what I described, but the collapse started at the far end and the near end supports didn't collapse, which is why the road buckled like it did.
Why wouldn’t the cross brace have been replaced? Seems that would be a significant weakening factor.
so lucky that it appears no one was seriously injured 
was governor then.