When I got back from San Francisco, I went by the grocery store on the way home from the airport to stock up for the busy week ahead. I'm glad I did, because I also immediately came down with a cold. I picked up a copy of Minnesota Monthly, our public radio magazine, because they've hired my favorite food writer, the one whose reviews I really trust.
But the article that had me up to late last night was by Beth Hawkins, a local journalist whose work I've liked over the years. She wrote this story about the I-35 bridge collapse, telling some of the many stories of those 110 minutes between the collapse and the moment when the last living victim was rescued. The stories are amazing.
I have refused to look at the bridge since that day, even though I drive past the site on the way home. At first it was out of sorrow for those who were still in the water, before they could find all the bodies. Then it was because I didn't need to see it to feel it. Now it is habit. I know they are building the new bridge, but I don't want to look. I'm so angry at how the governor has been choking off money for transit, how there has been no accountability.
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I saw some pictures the other day of beneath that bridge and how it had structure damage a year or two before the collapse. I’m nervous when it comes to holding specific people accountable. For example, I read a headline how the crane inspector for the New York incident (the other day) was being sought for an arrest warrant. My heart dropped because I have inspected equipment in the military I would not want to be arrested if I was wrong. There seems to be a demand for perfection. However I later read that the crane inspector had forged or lie about inspecting. That is a different ball game. But I’m afraid, very afraid that the two will eventually become one and people will be held accountable for things outside of negligence. For instance, my husband need hazmat inspectors and none of his employees are willing to go to the school so he will have to write hazmat into their job description thus forcing them to go to the school or lose their job. Some of the employees are lazy but the main concern (and I completely understand) is if something happens, if something goes wrong they (personally them) will be sued, will be fired or jailed, not the government or the corporation. There is something there that gets the corporation and the CEOs and the profit at all cost advocates off the hook while penalising the worker and it is scary. But then again if I lost a love one or if my love ones lost me who should be held accountable. I think governors and politicians who do not read what they sign is a good start, and of course criminally negligent inspectors (but not scapegoats).
Do you know if everyone have been found?
Kitty, yes, they have found and retrieved all the bodies as well as the vehicles, and identified all the dead and injured. Amazingly enough, only a relatively small number of people died (12, I think) but there were many with severe injuries, and others with trauma.
I understand what you are saying about confusing accountability with scapegoating. I would not want an individual inspector to be blamed, because it is rarely that person''s fault. In this specific case, we have department of transportation (MNDOT) inspectors that had been urging repair for years, and choices were made to short the repairs because of funding shortages. These funding shortages can be laid squarely at the feet of the Republican governor, who appointed a crony to be head of MNDOT, whose political interests trumped the recommendations of the engineers. In fact, she was finally forced out of that position, but she still remains the Lt Governor or the state! The governor has refused to provide any new funding for transportation, and we even lose federal funding every year because of the state's lack of commitment for matching funds. we are currently in a huge political showdown about the Democrats (and a few Republicans) vote to provide some transit funding, which the governor is trying to circumvent by cutting funding for public transportation. All public services in this formerly well-runn state have been gutted, and we are paying the price. The bridge was jut a particularly dramatic example of how "no new taxes" results in "no repairs" and what happens next. Nobody in the state has tried to foist the blame onto individual inspectors, because their record is clear; they did their job, but were ignored.
Yeah if there is any case that can be held up to demonstrate politicians ignoring the interest of the people and choosing to do something else this is most certainly the case. In a way it helps put more faith in the lower level of the system while clearly showing who is to blame, --the upper echelon who are more secured in their jobs.
It makes me think of some sinister fiction plot, ---Governor and lt. governor flies around the state in helicopter pointing at various bridges and laughing. As they sip their champagne and eat their chocolate strawberries, they say, “Look at those peons having to cross those unsafe bridges.” It really does mirror the old robber barons of the late 19th early 20th century.
Actually, it reminds me of John Sayles movies, like Silver City, where you see how the corruption pervades both the system and people's lives, even when they don't have the big picture.
...OT: amusement while ill: post to my open thread on tenure:
http://profacero.wordpress.com/2008/03/24/open-thread-on-tenure/
...closer to T: I am trying to brew a post on emotional reactions to the politics of disasters, having just had a strong one - one that felt like a hurricane.
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