Reporter Hart Van Denburg is at the scene of the Interstate 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis to report on the aftermath of the catastrophe.

4:58 p.m.
The first signs of roadside memorials are appearing. There are two small bouquets of flowers stuck into chain-link fence on a side road overlooking I-35W. One of the bouquets was from Mary Hovind.

Mary is a St. Paul nurse. She told me that she saw the bridge collapse on TV Wednesday and drove to the scene in an effort to volunteer.

"How could I not go?" she asked. "I had to come down to see if I could help."

She found herself at the Red Cross center talking with some of the members of the road crew that was on the bridge when it came down.

She said that all of the men were really distraught and were all waiting on word of one member of their crew who was missing that night -- and remains missing today.

Hovind came back today to place the flowers in the fence.

"I can't stop thinking about those guys," she said. "I'd never seen anything like it. It was something else."

4:12 p.m.
I just got off the phone with Internet Broadcasting affiliate NewsNet5.com in Cleveland. Their reporter, John Kosich, asked me a question that I hadn't really thought about. It was about me not only covering the story, but being a part of the story because it's in my city and affecting me.

Sometimes, you're so caught up in finding people to talk to and taking pictures and calling into to the office that you lose sight of the tragedy that's happened in your own back yard. There's been a terrible loss of life, and there's also been a huge impact on the way the city in which I live in goes about its business.

The wreckage in the river will likely take months to clear and I've already heard politicians on the radio trying to figure out how they're going to come up with the money to build a new bridge. And it all makes you wonder how long it's going to take for the city to get back on its feet.

It is also tough to think about how the people with lost loved ones' lives will never be the same.

I've never seen so many police in my life. There are police from all over the region: park police, campus, police from far-away counties. A lot of them are standing by themselves. They have grocery bags filled with drinks and snacks, as well as empty pizza boxes on the ground next to them. It's like they're camping out.

Also, on the Washington Avenue bridge that connects the University of Minnesota's East and West Bank campuses, students are walking and biking back and forth across the bridge. But the funny thing is, only a few of them are turning their heads to look at the river. The rest are just going about their way.

It's an odd scene of normalcy in a city that doesn't have much normalcy right now.

3:11 p.m.
I just interviewed Jay Reeves, a medic with the American Red Cross. He was driving home from work Wednesday night and was less than 100 feet from the bridge when it went down. Reeves was one of the first people to get to the school bus filled with children that was stuck on the bridge wreckage.

Reeves said that when he was driving up to the bridge, he saw it move. He thought to himself, "That's not right. Bridges don't move."

He parked and ran out onto the bridge and toward the bus and yelled, "If you can hear my voice and you can walk, get out."

When he got closer, he saw that there were already a number of children out of the bus -- but could also hear screaming and moaning still coming from inside. Soon, Reeves and couple of other good Samaritans were helping the rest of the children off of the bus through the rear emergency exit.

Reeves said that when the bridge came down, it came down in one big slab. To paint a picture of the image, he said imagine if the whole bridge were held up by a rope that was suddenly cut and just went straight down. As the bridge came down, it was enveloped in a rust-colored cloud.

2:51 p.m.
I'm standing outside of a day care center near the scene -- which is now surrounded by yellow police tape.

There's news media all over the place, but the day care center is deserted. But if there were a child sitting on the monkey bars at the day care center, all he would have to do is look across the playground through the trees to get a clear view of three to four wrecked cars stacked on top of each other. It's only about a block away.

The cars weren't moved there -- this is where they fell. It was that close. You can see one car upside-down on top of another, like a stack of wood. There's also a minivan on its side.

2:23 p.m.
I just talked with Colin Swanson, who works at a coffee house on University Avenue just a few blocks from the bridge.

Colin said that it's been crazy in the coffee house today, which is close to the media village. In the coffee house, you can see photographers -- with enormous lenses on their cameras -- editing photos on their laptops, and reporters filing stories.

Colin got off work here last night and was biking home when the bridge went down. He heard the noise and biked over toward the view of the river, and was stunned to see that there was nothing where there used to be an eight-lane highway.

1:50 p.m.
One of the interesting things to see is how quickly international news organizations mobilize for a disaster like this.

I was just on the roof of a Holiday Inn parking lot watching CNN interview a family who has a loved one believed missing in the wreckage. As I was taking pictures, the family became overwhelmed with emotion -- and the images of them crying and falling into each others' arms were suddenly carried around the world.

I then moved across the river to the East Bank near the university, where a small TV news village has set up shop. There are satellite trucks, reporters, photographers and videographers everywhere.

From where I'm standing right on University Avenue , I can see them clustered on an overpass over I-35, looking toward the river at the piles of twisted steel and crushed concrete. In one intersection alone there must be 15 or 20 television camera trained on the wreckage down toward the river.

12:55 p.m.
It's a blistering hot day under clear blue skies in Minneapolis.

Office workers on lunch break in downtown are streaming down to the river to try to get a look at the disaster -- but police have established a wide perimeter around the collapsed bridge and it is very difficult to get near the scene.

There's a news helicopter hovering above the scene. From a distance you can see recovery workers walking on portions of the collapsed wreckage and you can see recovery watercraft of various sorts on the river.

1 a.m.
By midnight an eerie quiet had descended on the river. The usual rumble of incessant traffic over the span was replaced by the crackle of police walkie-talkies and the murmurs of bystanders trying to get a view of the scene, talking with each other and into cell phones. Above, jetliners banked after take-off from the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, giving some passengers a better view than most.

On East River Flats, a park on the river's east bank, just below the University of Minnesota Hospital, and downriver from the disaster scene, there were dozens of rescue vehicles, boats on trailers, and a command post all illuminated by massive, trucked-in floodlights. Through the haze and across the water, more emergency vehicle lights could be seen on West River Road.

I worked my way to a spot where University Avenue crosses over I-35 W, and from there, through the police tape, I could clearly see the hundred or so yards to the collapse. A landscaping truck and a minivan were still teetering over the edge. The minivan's emergency flashers were still blinking. Heaps of crumpled metal pointed down to the water. Across the water I could see the burned-out hulk of an 18-wheeler.