FBI agents board ship operated by company whose other cargo ship caused Baltimore bridge collapse
BALTIMORE — Federal agents boarded a ship Saturday operated by the same company as a cargo ship that caused Deadly Collapse of Baltimore Bridgeconfirmed the FBI.
Spokespeople for the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Maryland confirmed in statements that authorities had seized the Maersk Saltoro, a ship operated by Synergy Marine Group.
“The FBI, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Criminal Investigation Division and the Coast Guard Investigation Service are present on board the Maersk Saltoro and are conducting court-authorized law enforcement activities,” statements from the FBI and the U.S. attorney’s office said Saturday morning.
Authorities did not provide further details. The Washington Post was first to report that federal authorities had boarded the ship.
The raid came several months after investigators conducted a similar search on the Dali, the cargo ship that crashed into the bridge.
In a lawsuit filed WednesdayThe U.S. Justice Department alleged that Dali’s owner, Grace Ocean Private Ltd., and manager Synergy Marine, both of Singapore, recklessly took shortcuts and ignored known electrical problems on the vessel, which lost power multiple times minutes before crashing into a support column on the Francis Scott Key Bridge in March.
The Justice Department said the massive ship’s mechanical and electrical systems were “tinkered with” and poorly maintained, leading to power outages and a cascade of other failures that left pilots and crew helpless in the face of impending disaster. The ship was heading from Baltimore to Sri Lanka when its rudder failed due to the loss of power.
Six members of a road works crew were killed when the bridge collapsed into the water. The collapse also paralyzed commercial shipping traffic in Baltimore Harbor for months before the canal was fully reopened in June.
The Justice Department is seeking to recover more than $100 million the government spent to clean up underwater debris and reopen the city’s port.
The companies filed a court petition days after the collapse, seeking limit their legal liability in what could become the costliest maritime accident case in history. Justice Department officials said there was no legal support for the attempt to limit liability and vowed to vigorously challenge it.
In its complaint, which also seeks punitive damages, the Justice Department argued that ship owners and operators must be “deterred from engaging in such reckless and extremely harmful conduct.”
This includes the Grace Ocean and Synergy themselves, as the Dali has a “sister ship,” authorities wrote in the claim.
Both companies “must be deterred because they continue to operate their vessels, including a sister ship to the Dali, in U.S. waters and benefit economically from those activities,” the complaint says.
Darrell Wilson, a spokesman for Grace Ocean, confirmed that the FBI and the Coast Guard boarded the Maersk Saltoro in the Port of Baltimore on Saturday morning. Wilson had previously said the owner and manager were “looking forward to our court hearing to set the record straight.”
Like the Dali, the Singapore-flagged Saltoro was built by Hyundai in 2015.
According to the Justice Department’s complaint, major problems with the Dali’s electrical system may have resulted from excessive vibrations on the ship, which can loosen cables and damage connections. A former captain of the ship had reported “severe vibrations” in his handover notes in May 2023, saying he had made similar reports to Synergy in the past, according to the complaint.
The complaint cited cracks in the engine room and pieces of cargo breaking loose. The ship’s electrical equipment was in such poor condition that an independent agency halted electrical testing for safety reasons, the complaint said.
The ship also experienced power outages while still docked in Baltimore. Those outages are considered “reportable marine accidents” that must be reported to the U.S. Coast Guard, which officials say never happened.
The Dali, which remained stuck amid the rubble of the collapse for months before it could be extracted and refloated, Departing from Norfolk, VirginiaThursday afternoon on his way to China for his first international trip since the March 26 disaster.
Justice Department officials declined to answer questions Wednesday about whether a criminal investigation into the bridge collapse was still ongoing. FBI agents boarded the Dali in April.
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Mattise reported from Nashville, Tennessee.
