35 years later, a memorial for victims of bridge collapse

Author: ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published:

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) – A monument has been dedicated to memorialize those killed in Tampa Bay’s 1980 Sunshine Skyway Bridge disaster.

The six-foot-tall monument was unveiled on Saturday, the 35th anniversary of the bridge collapse that killed 35 people.

A 600-foot freighter struck the southbound span of the bridge during a violent storm on May 9, 1980, causing eight vehicles on the bridge’s center section to collapse into Tampa Bay.

The granite memorial features the names of those killed and an engraving of the original Skyway Bridge, which had been a pair of side-by-side bridge spans made out of steel frames.

The monument is located at the water’s edge next to the Blackthorn Memorial Park in St. Petersburg on the northern side of the current Skyway.

Copyright ©2024 Fort Myers Broadcasting. All rights reserved.

This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without prior written consent.