Disasters: Collapse of the Silver Bridge

To those who suffer from gephyrophobia — fear of bridges — the alumi num-painted, 2,235-ft. span between Kanauga, Ohio, and Point Pleasant, W.

Va., was a constant horror. Christened in 1928 as the “Gateway to the South,” it swayed sickeningly to every vagrant breeze — so much so that Point Pleas ant Mayor D. B. Morgan banned its use during parades. Last week, under the bumper-to-bumper weight of cars, gravel trucks, and semitrailers, the “Silver Bridge” collapsed, carrying perhaps as many as 100 people to their deaths in the murky, near-freezing Ohio River waters 80 ft. below.

The first break in the bridge’s 2-in. by 12-in. Ibar suspension cables apparently came—at ten minutes to 5 p.m.—on the upriver, Ohio side. To Dick Kuhn, 18, a gas-station attendant, it sounded like a shotgun volley: “I thought some nuts were dusting ducks under the bridge.” Then the upstream side of the roadway tilted in surreal slow motion, spilling sparks from a parted power cable into the dusk and an estimated 60 vehicles onto the weedgrown riverbank and into the 6-m.p.h. current beneath. “It looked like a snake wiggling across the water,” one witness exclaimed. Said another: “The bridge just keeled over, starting slowly on the Ohio side and then folding like a deck of cards to the West Virginia side.”

Floating Cars. Spearlike steel girders cascaded into the shattered trucks and cars, pinning people against the bank and the riverbed. Others drifted free for a few moments. “I saw this car float past,” said Christmas-tree Salesman H. L. Whobrey. “It looked like there were people inside beating their hands against the windows.”

Two truck drivers managed to escape their sinking vehicles, unable to aid their driving partners asleep in the back. Bill Needham, 27, of Kernersville, N.C., was pushing a tractor-trailer rig to Milwaukee when he hit the water.

“I kept my eyes open, but the windows in the cab were rolled up. I began to feel for a handle—I felt and felt, holding my breath, until I noticed a little crack in the window. My partner was in the sleeping berth. He didn’t have a chance for survival.”

Rivercraft and rescue squads quickly swept.the scene for survivors, picking up at least eight, along with five bodies. Divers spotted three more corpses in a car but were unable to recover any of the victims pinned in the submerged scrap heap. It will take weeks of work to cut them all free. Some cars were doubtless swept downstream, and police estimated that it would be a long time—if ever—until a full count could be made of the victims. Mean while, Ohio Governor James Rhodes and his West Virginia counterpart, Hulett Carlson Smith, were pressing for an investigation to determine why the Silver Bridge failed.