Francis Scott Key Bridge (Baltimore)
The Francis Scott Key Bridge was a steel arch continuous through truss bridge that spanned the lower Patapsco River and outer Baltimore Harbor/Port in Maryland, United States. Opened on March 23, 1977, it carried the Baltimore Beltway between Dundalk in Baltimore County and Hawkins Point, an isolated southern neighborhood of Baltimore, while briefly passing through Anne Arundel County. The main spans and part of the northeastern approach of the bridge collapsed on March 26, 2024, after the container ship MV Dali struck one of its piers.
View from Fort Armistead Park in 2015
The Francis Scott Key Bridge under construction in 1976
Sign for the Key Bridge used on approach roads
Key Bridge with Baltimore in the background, viewed from Cox Creek Industrial Park, in northeast Anne Arundel County, November 2011 to the south
A continuous truss bridge is a truss bridge that extends without hinges or joints across three or more supports. A continuous truss bridge may use less material than a series of simple trusses because a continuous truss distributes live loads across all the spans; in a series of simple trusses, each truss must be capable of supporting the entire load.
The Astoria–Megler Bridge is North America's longest continuous truss bridge.
Smaller continuous truss bridge over the Illinois River at Lacon, Illinois
The Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge
The Sciotoville Bridge (1916), the first continuous truss bridge in the United States.
