Workers were on break in cars when Baltimore bridge collapsed, wife of survivor says

The Dali container vessel after striking the Francis Scott Key Bridge that collapsed into the Patapsco River in Baltimore, Maryland, US, on Tuesday. Photograph: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The construction workers who were on the Francis Scott Key Bridge when it collapsed in the early hours of Tuesday were on break in their cars, according to the wife of one of the construction workers who survived.

Speaking to NBC on Thursday, the wife of Julio Cervantes, one of the eight construction workers who was on the bridge when it collapsed, said: “All of the men were on a break in their cars when the boat hit. We don’t know if they were warned before the impact.”

“My husband doesn’t know how to swim. It is a miracle he survived,” Cervantes’ wife, who withheld her name, said, adding that her husband was treated for a chest wound in the hospital and released on the same day.

On Wednesday, officials announced that the bodies of two men who were trapped in their vehicle were recovered from the Patapsco River.

The men were identified as 35-year old Alejandro Hernandez Fuentes who was originally from Mexico living in Baltimore, as well as 26-year old Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera who was from Guatemala and was living in Dundalk, Maryland.

Officials said divers discovered the bodies in a red pickup truck in the river near the mid-span of the bridge.

Cervantes’s wife told NBC that her brother-in-law was one of the men whose bodies were recovered but did not disclose his name.

Four other construction workers who had been on the bridge remain missing and are presumed dead. The workers on the bridge, six in total, came from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, authorities said.

Cervantes’s wife also said her nephew is among the other missing men, adding that her entire family is of Mexican origin, NBC reported.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Mexican foreign ministry said the two people who are missing were originally from Veracruz and Michoacán.

Other people who are missing include 49-year-old Miguel Luna from El Salvador, a husband and father of three who lived in Maryland for over 19 years, and 38-year-old Maynor Yassir Suazo Sandoval, originally from Azacualpa in Honduras, a married father of two who had lived in the US for 18 years and launched his own maintenance business.

A crowdfunding campaign set up by the Latino Racial Justice Circle, a non-profit organization serving the Baltimore area, had raised nearly $100,000 for the victims’ families as of Wednesday afternoon. The funds will be distributed across the families and will be put towards basic needs including rent, groceries and utilities, the campaign said.