Searchers find two more bridge collapse victims

Crews have been searching the site for the past week for eight people missing and presumed dead in the Aug. 1 collapse.

Dave Hayhoe, the police homicide unit commander, announced the recoveries. He said the bodies were recovered by divers, but he gave no other information.

‘Right now the first priority is notifying the families,’ Hayhoe said.

The Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office said the first body was found shortly after noon and wasn’t immediately identified.

Among the eight are a pregnant nursing student and her 2-year-old daughter, a construction worker nicknamed ‘Jolly,’ and a former missionary who had been on his way to meet a friend for dinner.

As the recovery operation continued Thursday, so did the investigation into the cause of the collapse. Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board said they have found design flaws in the bridge’s gusset plates, which help tie the steel beams together.

That discovery prompted Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to advise states to carefully consider any additional stress placed on bridges during construction projects. An 18-person crew had been working on the Interstate 35W span when it collapsed during the evening rush hour.

State officials have announced tentative plans for a replacement bridge to be opened by the end of 2008. Gov. Tim Pawlenty also said he was willing to reverse his long-standing opposition to a state gas tax increase to pay for infrastructure improvements in the state.

At the bridge site, recovery crews have removed several vehicles from the river in the last two days, and Navy divers have searched for possible victims in and around the others.

In all, 88 vehicles have been located, both in the river and amid the broken concrete wreckage of the bridge, according to the State Patrol.

NTSB investigators have been trying to pinpoint where on the bridge the collapse began. Observations from a helicopter camera found several ‘tensile fractures’ in the superstructure on the north side of the bridge, but nothing that appeared to show where the collapse began, the NTSB said.

Investigators were still working to verify the loads and stresses on the beams, as well as materials in the plates.

They also were looking into reports of wobbling before the collapse.

The company that was doing construction work at the site, Progressive Contractors Inc., rejected a report that a worker noticed unusual swaying of the bridge in the days before its collapse. The company said it didn’t believe any of its work contributed to the bridge failure but hadn’t responded directly to claims of wobbling.