PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A cargo ship hit a bridge over the Delaware River Thursday, disrupting traffic between Palmyra, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, according to a Pennsylvania lawmaker.
The collision prevented the closure of the 3,500-foot Tacony-Palmyra Bridge, causing a major setback on the Philadelphia side, state Rep. Ed Neilson said in a news release. No injuries were reported, he said.
The U.S. Coast Guard said the cargo ship is currently docked at a Kinder Morgan facility in Bristol, Pennsylvania, where an inspection team is on site. The Coast Guard identified the vessel as the 591-foot (180-meter) Strategic Alliance, built in 2013 and sailing under the flag of Singapore.
The drawbridge was open to passing vessels at the time of the collision around 1:15 p.m., according to the Coast Guard. It subsequently remained open as another ship was due to pass through it and has since moved back down. The bridge reopened to traffic with a lane closure Thursday evening, the Burlington County (New Jersey) Bridge Commission Police Department said.
The steel bridge carries vehicles along Route 73 between Palmyra and the Tacony neighborhood in Northeast Philadelphia. It has three lanes of automobile traffic, two towards Philadelphia and one towards New Jersey. Estimates for 2025 show that the bridge will be able to carry up to 76,200 vehicles each day.
Opened in 1929, the Tacony-Palmyra Toll Bridge was found to be in “fair” condition, according to data from the Federal Highway Administration’s 2026 National Bridge Inventory released this fall.
Inspectors rated the Tacony-Palmyra Bridge deck as being in good condition, the substructure as being in fair condition and the superstructure – the component that absorbs the traffic load – as fair.
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Associated Press journalists Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City, Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, and Christopher L. Keller in Albuquerque, New Mexico, contributed.
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