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In the early hours of March 26, a container ship named Dali lost power and crashed into the support column of a Baltimore bridge, bringing down most of the 2.6 km long structure in a matter of seconds. The Francis Scott Key Bridge spanned across the Port of Baltimore, the busiest port in the US for car exports. Six people are presumed to be dead and a rescue mission is underway to recover their bodies.
As videos of the tragedy floated on social media, many conspiracy theorists compared the incident to a scene in the 2023 Obama-produced thriller movie Leave The World Behind, in which a container ship loses power due to a cyberattack, causing it to crash into a beach occupied by people.
Similarities between Baltimore bridge collapse and the ship scene in Leave The World Behind
The Baltimore bridge collapse attracted huge attention on social media due to the nature of the incident, and many conspiracy theorists online have spotted a resemblance between the tragic event and the ship scene in Leave The World Behind.
The apocalyptic psychological thriller movie, executively produced by former US President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, is adapted from an eponymous 2020 novel by Rumaan Alam.
In the movie, the protagonists, Amanda (Julia Roberts) and Clay Sanford (Ethan Hawke) are seen relaxing on the beach with their children when the couple's young daughter calls her mother to point out a massive container ship slowly looming towards the shore.
While the couple disregard it at first, the ship's continued movement towards them causes them to panic and run away as the massive vessel crashes into the shore without losing steam and slows to a halt once it hits the sand.
This scene caused an uptick among conspiracy theorists following the Baltimore bridge collapse, with loss of power being the reported reason in both instances for the ships to malfunction and crash.
A further delve into these theories revealed another coincidence. The ship in the movie was named the White Lion, and the container ship, Dali, that crashed into the Baltimore bridge was headed to Sri Lanka, whose flag has a lion in the centre.
Baltimore bridge collapse might cause significant disruption to global supply chains
According to the BBC, Marco Forgione, director general at The Institute of Export and International Trade in the UK, said that suspending maritime traffic through the Baltimore port would have a "significant ripple effect on global supply chains."
While the exact cause of the crash is yet to be established, officials reported that the ship suffered a "power issue" causing the crew to send out a distress call moments before the ship hit the Baltimore bridge.
The Dali left Baltimore's Seagirt Marine Terminal at around 12:24 am local time on Tuesday, March 26, en route Colombo, Sri Lanka. At around 1:25 am, MarineTraffic data showed that the ship had veered off course and was headed towards the Baltimore bridge's support structure.
As the ship slowed down, video footage showed the exterior lights on the vessel went out and the funnel started spewing smoke. At around 1:30 am, the ship crashed into the Baltimore bridge's pillar, causing the majority of the bridge to collapse into the Patapsco River below.
A construction crew of eight people were spotted on the bridge at the time of the incident. Two people were rescued, and officials reported that one was in a serious condition while the other person was seemingly uninjured.
The remaining six people are presumed to be dead of hypothermia due to the cold river water, the US Coast Guard reported. The search and rescue mission was suspended on Tuesday evening and a recovery mission was launched to locate the bodies of the presumed dead.
