You judge --- The boss of MnDOT at the time; a most heavily used river crossing bridge, perhaps carrying more daily traffic than any other - suggestions of need to repair. A subsequent academic MnDOT funded "study" arguably absolving guilt. A self-declared non-candidate for office in July 2007. A dog and pony show to declare for office in August 2007. After the bridge fell. Implying all along in coming forward then and afterward that the accident somehow resulted from or could be attributed to stinginess and negligence of intervening MnDOT stewards. The NTSB initially saying failed gussets were at fault. James Oberstar immediately jumping the NTSB preliminary mention of its result. Tinklenberg saying "metallurgy" as somehow negating the overlooked fact gusset plates were half as thick as design specifications required. What pattern do you see. Straight-up truthfulness up and down the line? Something else?
Why send that pattern, (all other baggage aside), that pattern alone - to the halls of Congress? To sit on the same committee as James Oberstar, the one who immediately jumped the "gusset" explanation of those not holding any stake in the outcome of investigation - the impartial forensic experts? WHY DID HE DO THAT?
And there is the November voting question: Is Michele Bachmann really that bad so that her act needs replacement by this act? Voters in Minnesota's Sixth District will have that choice. Their choice to make. The lobbyist or the laughingstock.
Here are facts:
First, Strib's publishing the timestamped photo showing bent gussets existed and were apparent a mere eight months after Tinklenberg left MnDOT as its head [with the likelihood of the bending occuring after he left, Oct. 2002, being minimal, given the remainder of the proof]:
Strib's photo caption: "Bent gusset plates on the Interstate 35 W bridge are seen, center, in this 2003 photo released by the National Transportation Safety Board. Old photos of the bridge show two gusset plates were visibly bent as early as 2003 -- four years before the span collapsed into the Mississippi River, killing 13 people. The plates are in areas believed to be among the first points of failure, and the photos are stamped with the dates June 10, 2003 and June 12, 2003."Strib then reports:
A Kansas City consulting firm suggested that the connectors on the I-35W bridge be examined and provided drawings of how it planned to strengthen areas around them. The firm, however, didn't get the contract. By MIKE KASZUBA, Star Tribune, Last update: June 14, 2008 - 6:50 AM
Seven years before the Interstate 35W bridge fell, a consulting firm sent Minnesota officials a proposal to shore up the aging structure that included examining its gusset plates -- the connections that federal investigators now believe likely played a role in the collapse.
The preliminary plan from HNTB Corp. of Kansas City, which was buried among hundreds of documents released at a recent legislative hearing, has gone largely unnoticed in the debate over the disaster. The company did its study at no cost in an attempt to gain a state contract for the bridge work but, in the end, wasn't hired by the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT).
A series of follow-up memos in 2000 and 2001 featured drawings of how HNTB planned to strengthen areas immediately surrounding the gusset plates and included renderings of "supplemental plates" and a "new oversize gusset." Other drawings called for adding supplemental supports in the vicinity of the gusset plates.
Although a top HNTB official said recently that it's impossible to say whether the company would have found the critical gusset plate problems now under investigation, the proposal is a rare documented instance in which experts explicitly planned to examine gusset plates.
"You have to check connections," Ray McCabe, HNTB's national bridge and tunnel director, said in describing what the company intended. "When you say connections, you naturally are describing the connections of these [large steel] members, which connect to gusset plates," he said. "You can't separate the bolts and the gusset; they form the connection."
McCabe said the study mirrored what MnDOT was also seeking -- a plan to add redundancy to a bridge that could collapse if one critical part failed.
The plan did pique the interest of Gray Plant Mooty, the law firm hired by a joint legislative panel to investigate issues surrounding the Aug. 1 collapse.
In its report to a legislative committee last month, the law firm contrasted HNTB's proposal with one from URS Inc., another national consulting firm that was eventually hired by MnDOT.
"Importantly ... the scope of the work under the URS contract did not include the analysis of the gusset plates that had been proposed by HNTB," Gray Plant Mooty said.
In addition, according to the law firm, HNTB last month confirmed that the company's cost estimate in its follow-up proposal "includes an item for the analysis of the 'connections,'" a term that includes the gusset plates, the firm said.
Documents released to the Legislature show that HNTB's preliminary report sat for more than a year before MnDOT decided to formally award a contract to study the bridge.
When it did so in 2003, MnDOT chose URS, which only a short time before had hired Don Flemming, formerly the longtime state bridge engineer at MnDOT.
Flemming left MnDOT in December 2000, seven months after HNTB made its initial proposal. He told the law firm that he "wanted to retire at the top of my game." A month later Flemming was hired by URS.
[emphasis added] It should be noted that the Fleming sweetheart contract was awarded after the Tinklenberg watch, but the sweetheart, himself, left during the Tinklenberg watch. And as Strib reports, quoted above, the primary safety concern is that there was no safety concern, during the end of the Tinklenberg watch, "Documents released to the Legislature show that HNTB's preliminary report sat for more than a year before MnDOT decided to formally award a contract to study the bridge." No Tinklenberg committment to spend a penny on safety concern, on what HNTB noted, is shown in Strib's reporting. The report sat. Tinklenberg sat. Regularly collecting his paycheck to be doing his job.
Reporting continues:
Flemming said that before MnDOT issued a request for proposals that led to URS' hiring, he made calls to MnDOT officials and talked with them about the services that he and URS could provide.
A URS spokesman last week said the company would not comment on the HNTB study, Flemming or the company's own study of the bridge.
MnDOT spokeswoman Lucy Kender likewise declined to comment on the matter, including what role, if any, Flemming's hiring by URS played in that company being hired.
The change of leadership at MnDOT during the time is a complicating factor. Two chiefs to blame about possible favortism to one of the former tribe indians. But you don't usually blame the indians, you blaim the chiefs. Especially the one who sat when the information was fresh, and in transitioning might not have said a word. But, URS did get a contract. Somebody knew a situation existed. Somebody new came aborard the top of the MnDOT heap - and did something. Doing nothing but letting the report sit was the Tinklenberg legacy. Probably not missing a paycheck all that time.
After all, Strib did report the HNTB matter was in 2000. Tinklenber left MnDOT late in 2002, and within a month had his "consultancy" Tinklenberg Group up and running. One can guess at Tinklenberg planning and priorities near the time he left.
Will there be a coverup, excuse making? Strib reporting continues:
She [MnDOT spokespoerson Lucy Kender] said MnDOT was preparing a detailed response to the Gray Plant Mooty findings, which she said would be released soon.
Hard to gauge 'level of concern'
Bruce Mooty, a lead attorney in the law firm's investigation, said it is difficult to speculate whether state officials missed an opportunity by not hiring HNTB. He said he could not gauge HNTB's "level of concern" regarding the gusset plates.
As it studied the bridge over four years, URS settled on a complicated steel replating plan for the bridge's main members that was ultimately set aside by MnDOT. How much the company focused on gusset plates is unclear, and URS officials have generally declined comment since the collapse.
One URS memo, written in 2005, said simply: "Gusset plate buckling -- if this occurs, it is not catastrophic."
Ed Zhou, a URS official, told Gray Plant Mooty investigators that the statement was hypothetical and related to the company's study of a similar bridge in Cleveland.
Zhou told the law firm that URS did discuss how to evaluate the strength of the connections on the 35W bridge, but added that "we determined that it's not necessary for us to get into the level of details of reexamining the gusset plate if they were designed properly."
Here it is worth noting that "design" was not noted by NTSB as the problem. "Half the proper designed thickness" was what NTSB said as a clearly determinable forensic matter, after the collapse. To that, Elwyn Tinklenberg is reported as saying thickness was not the sole factor, "metallurgy," he said was a factor.
There's a clear record of that, crabgrassed about here, quoting what I will requote now, from Hometown Source, (an ECM Publishing online service, a non-Strib source).
by T.W. Budig
ECM capitol reporter
Former Ventura Transportation Commissioner Elwyn Tinklenberg questions whether the recent preliminary findings by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) on the I-35W bridge collapse — a finding that suggested a design flaw likely brought down the bridge — has answered anything.
The NTSB’s asserts that the use of thinner connector plates in the bridge design — half-inch thick plates instead of inch thick — could have been a fatal design flaw.
But Tinklenberg explained that there’s also the issue of metallurgy.
Depending on how steel is tempered or otherwise fashioned, a half-inch steel plate can actually be stronger than an inch thick steel plate, Tinklenberg opined.
As I said in the earlier Crabgrass post, "Come on. They do not just spec a thickness. They specify a grade. If one-inch thick steel of a particular grade were specified; and 1/2 inch steel of that grade were used, well, the answer is --- what ---". The NTSB seems to have had it right,
A clear fact is that Elwyn Tinklenberg never was reported to have explained whether bridges ever are designed where thickness and quality grade of steels are not specified at the same time. He was reported only as saying "metallurgy." Without more detail, which Tinklenberg or spokesperson Wodele can easily supply, it is hard to judge whether pure, simple, dissembling excuse making is or is not at play. Strib continues:
Although the official investigation of the bridge collapse by the National Transportation Safety Board isn't expected to be completed until later this year, the NTSB has tentatively concluded that undersized gusset plates ordered in the original design of the bridge likely played a role.
Gray Plant Mooty records show that some MnDOT officials wanted to go ahead with hiring HNTB in late 2001. Notes from a December 2001 meeting at MnDOT, for example, show state bridge officials concluded that since replacing the bridge would not occur until at least 2016 "[we] decided to proceed with study HNTB/Dexter proposed."
MnDOT officials told the law firm that the delay between HNTB's late 2001 report and the decision to formally hire a consultant in early 2003 came because the agency could not hire the company without seeking competitive bids and had lingering questions about whether HNTB's plan would fix the bridge's weaknesses.
Dan Dorgan, who succeeded Flemming as state bridge engineer, acknowledged that "it appears that we made a choice not to push it that quickly." He said that MnDOT had competing priorities at the time, including building Minnesota's first light-rail line.
"They were very busy years for us," said Dorgan. "It was one of those things we intended to do, but it wasn't in our list of things."
Mike Kaszuba • 612-673-4388
[empahsis added] Wow, no. "... wasn't in our list of things." The Hiawatha line seemed to be atop that list. And in fairness to Elwyn Tinklenberg, Jesse Ventura was a big pushing factor for the light rail. He takes credit for it along with Tinklenberg. And as a pushing factor, we can all recall that Jesse could push hard. Should rumors of his contemplating a Senate run as an independent candidate prove true, unlike specualtion attributed to Norm Coleman that book promotion is a more major factor, then he would have to face the same questions about his hand-picked man, Elwyn Tinklenberg, being asleep at the bridge safety switch, because the light rail switch commanded a high degree of personal and fiscal attention.
And then that NTSB report not being expected to be completed "until later this year." Did someone with power and influence put the kibosh on any final conclusions surfacing before the November elections? The question is valid, along with the companion question, "If a hold was instructed in releasing final assessments, who would have been the one comanding that delay?" And, "If so, why, exactly?"
***
Bottom line: Instead of bridge safety (per Strib's reported proof), the Tinklenberg legacy priority was light rail spending. That clearly is a part of the record.
Money enough would have been there for fixing gussets but apparently no threat of derailing or delaying the light rail project - that dream - was anywhere near Elwyn Tinklenberg's front burner when he was tasked and trusted to protect the safety of Minnesota drivers on Minnesota's roads and bridges. If there is some other explanation than a high-profile politically helpful legacy planning intent, then it is up to Elwyn Tinklenberg to come forward, (something in many matters he has been reluctant to do), and give a full, cogent, and credible explanation omitting no details.
I feel there is a consistent pattern between lack of concern for the birdge safety situation, a failure to grasp the serious potentialities involved, and the comparable Elwyn Tinklenberg promoting and facilitating, for a substantial five figure total fee over time to Tinklenberg Group, the questionable use of taconite tailings as paving aggregate in Minnesota and elsewhere without being certain of its safety and with a taconite miner health study funded most recently and most recently reported by MPR as involving at least a three-year horizon to obtain reliable results from finalization of the study. I see two important instances where a man pays insufficnent attention, in my opinion, to questions of public risk and safety, while distracted by other goals and intentions. I wonder if there are implications about fitness for serving in Congress from that patterned behavior. I worry that there are.
-photo from MPR, online here, captioned, "This electron microscope photo shows a taconite fiber breaking up into smaller fibers in rat lung tissue. The state Health Department is conducting studies to see if taconite fibers can cause mesothelioma, a rare form of lung cancer which is usually associated with asbestos exposure. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Philip Cook, U.S. EPA)"
And, finally, make the bottom line your bottom line, not mine. The reporting can be read anyway YOU believe is fair and proper.
Go figure.
My big question --- why did James Oberstar so immediately jump on NTSB when their preliminary reporting talked about gussets? What was his state of mind, and why, in so doing? Had he anticipated "gussets" being a factor, and was thus ready to so immediately and forcefully speak? If so, what were the complete dynamics of the preparation steps and briefing he had? Had he formed his thinking alone? Had he had discussions? If so, with whom?
__________________
As a footnote, Strib deserves very great respect for wading through all the Gray Plant Mooty materials to report and summarize key facts. The report was published some time ago, available online, and I downloaded it with a full intent to sift through the evidence within it's multi-megabyte text and appendices [30 pounds of paper was reported].
Yet it was easy to put that task aside, for another day. Strib did the grunt work, their effort was a public service, and my using their work in extensive quoting is intended as a credit to their complete but tightly written analysis. Mike Kazuba, as the author, deserves some kind of public service award. It is not Woodward-Bernstein investigative journalism, it is combing through evidence and tightly but fairly summarizing what key evidence exists. Gray Plant Mooty produced the record - Mike Kazuba did a review that I had intended, but his work was of a quality I believe I would not have matched.
_____________UPDATE_______________
I tried to find the exact dates for the RFP for the contract URS eventually attained, and the date the award was made by MnDOT to URS. My understanding, which might be wrong, is as stated above - the RFP and contract were from after Tinklenberg left MnDOT, and the appearnace of directing things in a sweetheart manner was not his doing. The URS contract was put online by MnDOT, here, and p17, the signature page, shows it was signed Dec. 19, 2003, well after the Tinklenberg departure. The issuance date of the RFP is something that I have yet to pin down. With a Dec. 2003 contract date, the likely answer is the RFP was issued after Tinklenberg's departure from MnDOT, Oct. 2002.
Also, I was wrong, apparently design specifications, with missing records at the engineering firm a problem, were for 1/2 inch gussets rather than 1 inch gussets.
I say I was wrong based on Strib reporting about this in detail, here, Jan. 17, 2008, and in that same article reporting on the earliest NTSB statements along with Oberstar's jumping on that as premature, and contrary to his speculative contention that ongoing infrastructure funding neglect was the major determinant. It would be nice if Strib, in what likely is ongoing coverage, publishes online a definitive timeline, bridge related milestones along with changes in stewardship at MnDOT. Finally, there is an information-laden page MnDOT has posted, and I expect Strib's coverage will also catalog or highlight the several reports mentioned, by MnDOT here.
Finally, on this page, MnDOT links to the "University of Minnesota Study, March 2001 --- Fatigue Evaluation of the Deck Truss of Bridge 9340," which I posted about previously, here, here, and then here. I still am uncertain where that U.Minn. study during the Tinklenberg MnDOT tenure fits into things - was it a figleaf cover, or cause to say Elwyn Tinklenberg had less culpability than might otherwise appear to be the case. Finally the dog-and-pony show circumstances of the Tinklenberg reluctant-candidate-because-the-bridge-fell situation are mentioned, here.
I have added this UPDATE to tie down a few, not all, loose ends in the above post. Any reader comments or added information are welcome.