[ Evidently this is becoming more common, sadly.  See
https://tinyurl.com/ypczpafx ]

From: https://tinyurl.com/yckukbrt (jsonline.com)

===
  Rhode Island man clung to Kilbourn Avenue Bridge railing before losing grip,
                         falling to death, report says

   Sophie Carson
   Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

   A 77-year-old Rhode Island man was vacationing in Milwaukee with his wife
   when he died in a gruesome fall as a downtown bridge opened, authorities
   said.

   Richard Dujardin of Providence, Rhode Island, is seen in an undated family
   photo. Dujardin died when he fell from the Kilbourn Avenue Bridge in
   Milwaukee as it was opening.

   As more details emerged Tuesday about the man's death, questions remained
   as to how the bridge operator - controlling it remotely - could have
   missed the man on the bridge in surveillance video. He is now on leave.

   Just after noon Monday, Richard Charles Dujardin, a former religion
   reporter who lived in Providence, Rhode Island, was crossing the Kilbourn
   Avenue Bridge over the Milwaukee River with his wife, Rose-Marie,
   according to a report from the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner's Office.

   Richard was looking at an iPad while walking, the report said.

   Rose-Marie made it all the way across the bridge to its east side, and
   Richard was still in the middle of the bridge when it began to rise,
   according to the medical examiner. 

   "The lights, bells, and arms came down at each end of the bridge,
   however Richard was hard of hearing and it is thought that he didn't
   notice them," the report said.

   Police officers close off access to the Kilbourn Avenue Bridge after a
   77-year-old man was found dead on the bridge Monday afternoon.

   Dujardin, who also walked slowly and used a hearing aid, tried to catch up
   to his wife when the bridge began to open, but he couldn't make it to her
   in time. He grabbed onto the side railing and held on for one to two
   minutes as the bridge continued to rise, the report said.

   He held on as the bridge deck rose to a 90-degree angle but eventually
   lost his grip and fell 71 feet to the concrete street behind him, the
   report said.

   Dujardin suffered head trauma and died from his injuries at the scene, the
   medical examiner said.

   Witnesses on Monday said police performed CPR when they responded to the
   scene. Paramedics also used a defibrillator to try to revive him.

   The Dujardins were in Milwaukee on vacation and were staying at a hotel
   downtown. They were supposed to fly home Monday, the report said.

   This is the Milwaukee Kilbourn Avenue Bridge along West Kilbourn Avenue
   where a Rhode Island man died Monday, Aug. 15, 2022, as the bridge was
   going up.

Remote bridge operator on leave

   Milwaukee police on Tuesday said they did not suspect the bridge operator
   had committed a crime, but an investigation remained ongoing.

   The medical examiner's report said detectives were planning to interview
   the operator.

   Jerrel Kruschke, interim commissioner of public works, said the operator
   "was fully trained and in his fourth year as a bridge operator having
   conducted hundreds of bridge openings."

   "He is currently on leave following this incident and was connected with
   the City's Employee Assistance Program for counseling," Kruschke said in a
   statement.

   A car passes over the Kilbourn Avenue Bridge.

   The Kilbourn Avenue Bridge is operated remotely from the Water Street
   Bridge house. 

   The operator must check two cameras with live footage of the bridge before
   opening it, the medical examiner's report said.

   "It seems weird that they wouldn't have seen that there was still a person
   halfway on the bridge when they were opening it," said Cheryl Nenn,
   riverkeeper for the Milwaukee Riverkeeper, an advocacy group for the
   Milwaukee River Basin.

   About half the 20 movable bridges in the city are operated remotely, the
   Department of Public Works said.

   Remotely operating bridges is "a safe and standard industry practice,"
   Kruschke said.

   A drawbridge goes back down after a boat passes through along East
   Kilbourn Avenue on the Milwaukee River in Milwaukee on Monday, Aug. 8,
   2022.

   In 2021, the city recorded more than 27,700 openings at its movable
   bridges. That's up 19% from 2017, according to DPW data.

   And the Kilbourn Avenue Bridge has seen an 87% rise in openings since
   2017. The boost is in part due to a boat line that moved farther up the
   river last year, according to Urban Milwaukee. Five additional bridges now
   stand between the Milwaukee Boat Line and Lake Michigan, including
   Kilbourn.

   Nenn pointed out the thousands of annual bridge openings and said
   incidents like this, while tragic, are rare.

   "In general, they seem to operate those bridges very efficiently and
   well," she said. "I've never heard of something like this happening."

   Nenn said she hasn't heard complaints about the bridge operators
   previously but welcomed an investigation into the safety measures in
   place.

   "Clearly, they're going have to examine what happened and make sure that
   there's additional safety precautions to ensure this doesn't happen
   again," she said.

   Nenn also noted that pedestrians should wait until the traffic gates
   reopen to begin crossing the bridge again. She's noticed that sometimes
   pedestrians start to cross when the bridge looks like it's down, but
   bridge operators need to do some final jostling.

Dujardin was a longtime religion reporter

   Dujardin reported on religion for the Providence Journal newspaper in
   Rhode Island for 36 years, according to the Religion News Association.

   He won the association's lifetime achievement award in 2015 and served as
   its president in the 1990s.

   "Dujardin traveled widely to cover Pope John Paul II, interviewed a future
   pope and a past U.S. president, covered Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell, and
   the Dalai Lama," an article posted to the association's website read.

   Dujardin was born in 1944 in New York City and attended high school on
   Long Island and college at Fordham University.

   He began working at the Providence Journal after graduation in 1966 before
   joining the U.S. Naval Reserve as an officer for three years. He returned
   to the paper and in 1977 became the religion reporter.

   "Religion writing, as most of us in the field know, is a satisfying
   experience," Dujardin told the Religion News Association when he received
   the lifetime achievement award.

   "It allows us to ask important questions that most other reporters usually
   ignore, allowing us to ask people about their faith lives and to see what
   really makes them tick. As it is, a lot of motivation behind the good
   things people do springs from their faith and from the way they perceive
   God."

   Dujardin and his wife, Rose-Marie, had six children.

Bascule bridges operate like a seesaw

   The city's 20 movable bridges include 13 bascule bridges.

   The Milwaukee Riverkeeper describes the movement of the seesaw-like
   bascule bridge this way: it has "a roadbed that swings upward and is
   continuously balanced by a counterweight."

   The upward rotation is facilitated by a gear underneath the bridge called
   a pinion.

   An early bascule bridge was the medieval drawbridge. It "provided a water
   crossing and an effective barricade when raised," the Riverkeeper said on
   its website.

   The Kilbourn Avenue Bridge was completed in 1929. It was restored in 2008.
===
 
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