What happens to the Dali container ship now that it’s back at port in Baltimore?

Nearly two months after knocking down the Francis Scott Key Bridge, the container ship Dali is back in Baltimore. The Dali had been resting on the muddy floor of the Patapsco River since the March 26 crash. For most of that time, it was trapped under a portion of the bridge it destroyed, but on May 13, a crew set off controlled explosions to free it, with plans to “refloat” it in a matter of days.

When did the Dali finally budge?

The badly damaged container ship was “refloated” at about 6:40 a.m. Monday. Five tug boats then began pushing it toward the Seagirt Marine Terminal in Baltimore at about 1 mile per hour. It is now at the terminal.

How do you ‘refloat’ a container ship?

For the partially loaded 95,000-gross-ton ship to spend weeks on the river bed was all part of the plan. Coast Guard Rear Adm. Shannon Gilreath, a key official in the response, said crews trying to disentangle the ship from a vast section of the bridge needed the Dali to move as little as possible in the water. So workers filled ballast tanks aboard the ship with vast amounts of water to weigh the Dali down, preventing it from swaying in the shipping channel and endangering workers on cranes and perched in hanging steel baskets, Gilreath said.

To refloat the ship, crews began emptying those tanks, allowing the Dali to rise up from the floor and get on its way.

What happens to the crew now?

The crew remained on board the ship for the nearly two months it was trapped under the bridge and resting on the riverbed. Darrell Wilson, a spokesman for the ship’s operator, Synergy Marine, has said the ship is a “living piece of equipment” that still needs to be cared for by the crew, who also continue to be part of ongoing investigations into what caused the Dali to veer off course.

The company is working with authorities “to see what the next steps are in securing possible shore leave for the crew,” Wilson said Monday morning. “We’ll certainly be working with the authorities to try to get that crew off the ship.” In the meantime, he said, the company is making sure the crew’s needs are met. Wilson said FBI investigators took crew members’ phones as part of an ongoing investigation. The company has given them new ones, though they are eager to get their original phones back, he said.

David O’Connell, the Coast Guard captain of the Port in Baltimore, said crews on such container ships are typically scheduled to be on board for months at a time, and he expects some Dali crew members to be swapped out on an individual basis.

“I don’t know the exact time when they’re going home,” O’Connell said. “Usually crews are on anywhere from six to 12 months, and they rotate out.”

Wilson also said he had no timeline. “At some point, we certainly want to get the crew back home so they can see their families and loved ones,” he said. “With everything going on in the investigations into the cause of the incident, we have to just work closely with the authorities.”

What’s happening with the investigations?

The National Transportation Safety Board is continuing its probe into the causes of the Dali disaster, with investigators hoping to complete it in roughly 18 months. A Coast Guard investigation is also ongoing. And the FBI is moving ahead with a separate criminal investigation, including into whether the crew knew of serious system problems before setting out in the early morning hours on March 26.

In a preliminary report last week, the NTSB documented two critical blackouts aboard the Dali on the day of the crash, as well as a pair of other power outages during routine maintenance in port the day before.

NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy told members of Congress last week that investigators are trying to “replicate some of the electrical problems that were seen” on the day of the crash. Investigators are looking at how circuit breakers aboard the ship were configured after the initial outages, and whether that might have been related to the electrical failures just before the collision.

The root cause of those sudden, unexpected blackouts on March 26 is “what we’re really focused on,” Homendy said.

What happens to the Dali next?

It will stay in Baltimore for four to six weeks, according to the Coast Guard’s O’Connell. Crews need to remove a collapsed stretch of roadway that is still strewn atop the ship, along with other debris. The ship will eventually head to Norfolk for more permanent repairs, O’Connell said.

Wilson, the Synergy Marine spokesman, said he did not have information about how long the Dali will stay in Baltimore or what will happen with the ship after that. “It’s just too far ahead for me to determine that yet,” he said.

What about the cargo on board?

The Dali’s operator says the containers need to stay on the ship so it will sit low enough in the water to travel under the Chesapeake Bay Bridge when it heads to its next destination.

O’Connell said some containers could be unloaded in Baltimore. But Wilson said “the goal is not to unload the containers here,” because their weight is needed to help get the ship under the Bay Bridge.

Synergy Marine said the Dali can hold 10,000 20-foot containers and was just under half full when it crashed. Scores of containers that were either damaged or risked falling on salvage crews were removed while the ship sat amid the Key Bridge’s wreckage.

Synergy referred questions on what was being hauled in the thousands of red, yellow, white and blue containers to the ship’s charterer, Maersk Line, Limited, which did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Among the wide range of goods being moved were soybeans. The Maryland Department of Emergency Management said in April that crews had addressed concerns about hazardous gases from rotting soybeans. “Fermented beans have been bagged and all soybean cargo is being removed,” the emergency officials wrote.

When will the shipping channel fully reopen?

Officials from the Coast Guard and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said the channel has been cleared of bridge debris and other wreckage down to 48 of its usual 50 feet, though it is narrower than normal. More than 35 deep-draft vessels have already made it in and out of the port, including the car-carrying ships that are a key economic driver for Baltimore, officials said. More than 300 smaller barges and other ships have also made it through limited or temporary channels.

Nick Ameen, public information officer for the Key Bridge response, on Monday said that in the coming days the main shipping channel would be operating at 400 feet wide and 50 feet deep. Work will continue until the channel “is restored to its original width of 700 feet and all steel below the mudline is removed,” federal and state authorities said in a joint statement. That will allow two-way vessel traffic to resume.

Officials say they are on track to fully reopen the main shipping channel by the end of May.