On April 13, 1949, steelworker Phil Orlando was standing on top of the newly finished 500 foot tall east tower of the second Tacoma Narrows Bridge. The concrete pedestal from the first Narrows Bridge, affectionally known as Galloping Gerty, was still in place beneath the 50 stories of rivited steel he was standing on and just a few days earlier the bridge builders had completed a major lift, placing the critical first cable saddle on top of the tower. Phil was standing on the huge steel casting which would guide the suspension bridge’s main cables up and over the towers. The saddles carried the tremendous weight and tension of the continuous main cables which traveled from massive anchorages buried on each shore. He was working on the bolts which held the saddle in place, the last major task before the riggers would begin spinning miles of wire rope into the main suspension cables.

At first, he felt a slight tremor underfoot and then the entire tower structure began swaying wildly enough to throw him off his feet. As he jumped off the 21 ton casting it broke loose, snapped off the bolts fastening it to the tower and began sliding toward him across the tower roof. Phil’s only option was to jump back onto the moving saddle just as the tower top whipped sharply the other way about six feet.

In an instant, the massive cast metal saddle was airborn just as Phil managed to catch a saftey belt hanging from a boom hoist. The 7.1 Olympia earthquake Orlando was experiencing was epicentered between Tacoma and the State Capitol and for its 30 second duration he must have felt like a spar pole cutter who had just topped a tree and was holding on for the wild ride that followed.

Meanwhile the 42,000 lbs. saddle was making its way towards the Narrows channel in a fall that took 5.5 seconds. An unfortunately located Foss barge was directly in its path and the saddle hit it at 129 miles an hour with an estimated 32,000,000 foot pounds of force. Two workers on the barge were launched into the Narrows and the main compressors, tools and assembly materials were lost as the casting shot through the deck of the flat vessel.

The next day, at the first slack tide, hard hat diver Art McCray went down and found the compressors and wreckage on the first try. Then, on the evening of the second day he located the saddle in about 140 feet of cloudy water and rigged a line to it. Over the next few days, the saddle was raised and evaluated for damage. Engineers determined that “minor repairs” would be required but without any serious delays, the saddle was hoisted back onto the tower. By October the cable spinning began and continued through the terrible winter of 1950. By March the suspender cables were hung and the deckwork began. The second Tacoma Narrows bridge was opened on October 14, 1950. The once fallen 20 ton cable saddle that danced from under Phil Orlando’s feet and visited the depths of the Narrows during the 1949 earthquake is still up there carrying its weight.