By Frank McGurty
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A Mexican Navy sailing ship festooned with lights and a giant flag crashed into the landmark Brooklyn Bridge on Saturday night, shearing the top of its masts, killing two people and injuring several others, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said.
Videos online showed the training vessel Cuauhtémoc as it approached the bridge over the East River, close to the Brooklyn side of the span, which connects the borough with Manhattan.
Its 147-foot (45-metre) masts were too tall to clear the arched bridge at that point and toppled when the vessel, named after the last Aztec emperor, sailed underneath.
The Mexican Navy said on social media late on Saturday that 22 people were injured on board the ship, of which 19 were receiving medical attention in local hospitals, and three were seriously injured.
New York City's Adams put the injured total at 17.
No diving rescue operations were needed because none of the 277 people onboard fell into the water, the Navy said.
Naval cadets dressed in white uniforms could be seen dangling from the ship's crossbeams after the crash.
A female cadet and a male Marine died from their injuries, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told reporters on Sunday. Two of the injured remained in critical condition as of Sunday afternoon, the New York Police Department said.
Sheinbaum said Mexico's Navy was investigating the cause of the crash and that injured cadets were "doing better." The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is also investigating.
New York police said mechanical issues had probably caused the crash, without providing further details.
At one of the suspension bridge's bases, near the Brooklyn Bridge Park, online videos showed bystanders running in terror as the massive vessel hit the bridge and veered toward the shore.
The bridge, a popular tourist attraction and a main conduit between Manhattan and Brooklyn, was completed in 1883. It was once the largest suspension bridge in the world.
The bridge sustained no major damage, a New York City transportation official said. Traffic reopened in both directions after a preliminary inspection.
Earlier, Mexico's foreign ministry said on social media that Mexico's ambassador to the U.S. and other officials were assisting affected cadets and had been in contact with local authorities.
The Cuauhtémoc was built at the Celaya Shipyards in Bilbao, Spain, in 1981, according to the South Street Seaport Museum, which said on its website it was co-hosting the vessel's visit to New York, which had been scheduled to conclude on Saturday evening. The public was invited to come aboard the ship during its visit.
The ship was disembarking from New York before heading to Iceland, the New York police official said.
(Reporting by Frank McGurty in New York and Timothy Gardner in Washington; Additional reporting by Brendan O'Boyle and Stefanie Eschenbacher in Mexico City and Chandni Shah in Bengaluru; Editing by Jamie Freed and David Holmes)
