Impact On Baltimore Downtown Region
Thousands of Baltimore workers were forced to leave their jobs and unable to come back for several days until the city could assure that there was no further danger from either the fire or the water main flooding. The crash also impacted MARC passenger train service for several days; bus routes were set up by the city to ferry passengers to and from the BWI Amtrak/MARC station as an alternate route. MARC service was restored on July 23, 2001.
Most of the roads around Howard Street, including I-395 spur into Baltimore, experienced extremely heavy congestion due to street closures around the intersection of Howard and Lombard Streets, where the actual water main break occurred. By July 24, 2001, all but the blocks immediately surrounding the water main break were reopened to automotive traffic.
Three weeks later, manhole covers flew into the air as underground explosions along West Pratt Street occurred due to residual explosive chemicals from the fire left in the sewers.
Smoke from the incident and flooding from the broken water main caused three Baltimore Orioles baseball home games to be canceled that summer, as Oriole Park at Camden Yards was directly in the danger zone caused by the fire.
Read more about this topic: Howard Street Tunnel Fire
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