At 7779 feet, the Sidney Lanier Bridge has the longest span of any bridge in Georgia. Reaching a height of 480 feet, it’s a replacement for the 1956 vertical-lift bridge of the same name. On 7 November 1972 the African Neptune struck the earlier bridge, resulting in ten deaths. On 3 May 1987 that bridge was again struck, this time by the Polish freighter Ziemia Bialostocka. Like Savannah’s Talmadge Bridge, the new bridge’s cable-stayed construction is more stable and allows the necessary greater height for the booming container ship traffic of the Georgia coast.