‘I said a soft prayer for everybody I handled': diver reflects on recovering victims from Skyway Bridge collapse

Yahoo

09-05-2025

MANATEE COUNTY, Fla., (WFLA) – Today marks 45 years since the Sunshine Skyway Bridge collapsed and claimed the lives of 35 people.
8 On Your Side's Alessandra Young spoke with a diver who went into the water that day and recovered several of the victims.
May 9, 1980, will forever be a part of history.
Bob Raiola and his partner, Mike, performed underwater inspections for DOT and county bridges.
'28 people were killed on impact from blunt force trauma, seven people drowned,' Bob Raiola said.
They had stepped out for a cup of coffee when they got the call that no one was prepared for.
'I said a soft prayer for everybody I handled': diver reflects on recovering victims from Skyway Bridge collapse
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'Back then, there was no procedures or anything set up for that type of disaster. There was no glass case on the wall at the office that said smash, in case the Skyway gets knocked down,' Raiola said.
Raiola said the 19,734-ton Summit Venture freighter was caught in a severe microburst and had lost all radar contact. When the cargo ship hit the bridge, the impact took out over 1,200 feet of the entire Southbound side.
The divers said they got there as quickly as they could.
'We finally geared up and rolled into the water and tumbled into the water, backwards, and I immediately spotted the bus driver. Mike Curtin, behind the wheel, he had his white shirt on, so he was very visible, he was only in about 10 or 15 feet of water,' Raiola said.
The diver said the bus driver was the first victim he saw and was able to recover. His partner, Mike, treaded water outside the bus to retrieve the victims.
'I positioned Mike on the outside of the bus and went into the bus myself and recovered a couple of victims. Then, passed them off to Mike, who hung onto them, and I went back in and recovered two more,' Raiola said.
After recovering four victims, Raiola went back in a second time and recovered three more, making their total 7.
'It was during that time that I came across what I would call a baby bag, and I became a little bit more emotional in regard to what we were trying to accomplish,' Raiola said.
As a combat veteran in Vietnam, Raiola said he was used to trauma, but this was different.
To this day, he relives this experience every time he talks about it or crosses the Skyway.
'I said a soft prayer for everybody I handled; I apologized for the rough treatment that I was going to give them, that I needed to do to get them extricated from that situation,' Raiola said.
45 years later, Raiola wants people to know that the new bridge is safe and that the piers are protected to prevent another tragedy like this one from happening.
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