JESSE WATTERS: The Baltimore bridge collapse could have been a lot worse

Fox News host Jesse Watters lays out what he believes happened before a cargo ship crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore in his opening monologue Tuesday on "Jesse Watters Primetime."

JESSE WATTERS: Authorities have called off the rescue mission in Baltimore after hours of searching for survivors in the cold, dark water. All six missing people are now presumed dead. At 1:30 in the morning, a colossal cargo ship crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, sending one and a half miles of steel and concrete tumbling into the water. 

How did this happen? State and federal officials aren't saying much, but here's what we can tell you: The ship left port, heading towards India. The ship's lights started flickering on and off, and it lost power. The ship then makes a sharp turn and black smoke billows from the top, which indicates an aggressive and desperate attempt to change direction. The vessel dropped an emergency anchor, but it was too late. A mayday call went out right before impact, and officials on the ground closed off the bridge to traffic, but a construction crew wasn't able to escape. They fell nearly 200 feet into the pitch black river, alongside tons of mangled metal and debris.

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A LOOK AT THE 35 MAJOR US BRIDGES THAT COLLAPSED AFTER BEING STRUCK BY SHIPS AND BARGES SINCE 1960

Two people were rescued. And the other six are now presumed dead after rescue teams spent hours using sonar and underwater drones to search the river, as divers navigated the dangerous wreckage. 30,000 people cross this bridge daily. This could have been a lot worse. There are safeguards in place to prevent this, but somehow they all failed. The anchor was designed to stop the ship, and barriers surrounding the pylons are designed to protect the bridge. It's an active investigation, but almost immediately, the FBI waived off the possibility of a terror attack.

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Today was that agent's first day on the job as head of the Baltimore field office. And we hope he's right. The governor says the bridge was structurally intact before the ship slammed into it. But the ship has a bad track record. In 2016, it crashed into a stone wall at a port in Belgium, damaging its stern. Just last year, while the vessel was being inspected in Chile, they found it had propulsion and auxiliary machinery issues.

The companies that chartered and operated this cargo ship are foreign. It flew under a Singapore flag and was commissioned by a Danish company. And if they're at fault, they owe us a new bridge. Biden wants to rebuild it with our tax dollars.

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We have to get to the bottom of this. A cargo ship hasn't taken out a bridge in decades, and a ship, as far as we can tell, has never sustained a power failure before a bridge knocked down. We need answers. Someone has to pay.