Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department maintenance employees on Monday confirmed previous assessments that two bridges that span the Arkansas River that were struck by loose barges Friday night won’t require repairs.

“We wanted to make sure the bridge structures themselves weren’t struck,” said Randy Ort, the agency’s spokesman.

Federal, state and local agencies responded Friday after a wire cable connecting a load of 12 barges snapped, causing some of them to float freely and scrape the pier protectors on the Interstate 30 Bridge and Clinton Presidential Park Bridge.

Police blocked access to the I-30, Main Street and Broadway bridges briefly Friday night, backing up traffic for as much as a half-mile on the North Little Rock sides of the bridges while officials completed a preliminary inspection.

The barges, traveling in a two-by-six formation, began to float adrift after one of them struck a protective structure at the base of the I-30 bridge and caused the cable to snap, said Lt. j.g. Brian Porter, spokesman for the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Lower Mississippi River.

Coast Guard officials responded Friday, helping to round up the barges and began an investigation that should last about six months, Porter said. They questioned the captain of the towboat, who was also tested for drugs and alcohol, Porter said. Porter would not release the captain’s name or discuss the specific details of the investigation.

Speaking generally, he said incident investigations can lead to license revocations and, at times, criminal charges if investigators determine human error or negligence were contributing factors.

The towboat is owned by Ingram Barge Co. of Nashville, Tenn. A spokesman for Ingram Barge Co. said Monday that the boat was leased and operated by Inland Marine of Hebron, Ky. A woman who answered the phone at Inland Marine on Monday referred questions to the company’s owners, who did not return a phone message.

All of the barges were recovered Friday night, said Elizabeth Fielding, spokesman for Ingram Barge Co.

One was deemed too damaged to travel, and workers transferred its contents to another barge before the barges were reassembled and sent on their way to their destination in Rosedale, Miss., early Sunday morning, Porter said.

Ort said employees with the Highway Department’s heavy bridge division who viewed the contact sites Monday were confident that the bridges are safe and that the protective cells that surround the bridges’ piers would not need repairs.

The barge that struck the I-30 bridge “just took a glancing blow,” he said. “The pier protector really did its job.”

And while the impact appeared to be more severe on the Clinton bridge, the pier protectors “are still intact and still functioning,” Ort said.

“We needed to err on the side of caution,” he said. “I think it was great coordination between the local and state departments in this case.”

Arkansas, Pages 16 on 08/27/2013