Under intense scrutiny from engineers, politicians and the public, Bruce A. Magladry, director of the National Transportation Safety Board office of highway safety, oversaw a 15-month probe of the 2007 I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis, in which 13 people died and 145 were injured. Early on, it became clear to the NTSB team that underdesigned gussets, which NTSB said were half as thick as required, were a key factor in the accident. Magladry urged the board to take the unusual step of issuing a safety recommendation before the investigation was finished, and the board agreed.
On Jan. 15, 2008, NTSB called on the Federal Highway Administration to require states planning changes to non-load-path-redundant steel truss bridges to do load calculations to verify that stress levels in gussets and other structural elements were within requirements. It was only the second interim recommendation in the past 10 years stemming from a NTSB highway safety office probe.