By Sarah Light, staff writer

Wednesday evening was one of worry for many Albert Leans after hearing the news of the Interstate 35W bridge collapse over the Mississippi River.

The bridge collapsed shortly after 6 p.m.

Whether people were simply left in disbelief after hearing about the collapse or were scrambling to contact family members who might have been affected, the news hit close to home for all.

Albert Lea resident Mary Ellen Johnson said she was out at the Freeborn County Fair around 8 p.m. Wednesday when she called her son, Matt, who was traveling to Duluth with some friends to attend a concert.

Johnson said her son normally doesn&8217;t take the I-35W bridge when he is traveling, but she still decided to make the call to find out if he was OK.

&8220;When I called him, he said, &8216;I&8217;m in Duluth, however, I went over that bridge at 5:25 p.m.,&8217;&8221; she said. &8220;My knees went weak when he said that.&8221;

Johnson said she and her son only talked for a few minutes because they knew the cell phone circuits were full and didn&8217;t want to clog up a line.

&8220;We knew that he was OK, so we just let him go,&8221; she said.

Matt said when he drove over the bridge close to 5:30 p.m. that was actually the third time that day for him to drive it. At that point, there were no construction workers out, he noted.

&8220;I was shocked,&8221; he said of how he felt when he heard the news of the collapse. &8220;You&8217;d think that they inspect those things a lot. That kind of thing really shouldn&8217;t happen. You&8217;d think there&8217;d be more warning.&8221;

The bridge collapse was the topic of conversation Wednesday at the fair.

&8220;They were feeling like &8216;My gosh, this is really close to home,&8217;&8221; Johnson said. &8220;You read it in the paper about San Francisco or some other place, but this time it really hit close to home.&8221;

It made her realize how much people take the roads for granted, she said.

&8220;Everyone always talks about how they want to keep taxes low, but our taxes do pay for stuff like this, and we need to be aware of this,&8221; Johnson said. &8220;It brings it home in a really powerful way. It just kind of takes your breath away.&8221;

While many people were at the Freeborn County Fair Wednesday evening when the news broke of the collapse, some had traveled up to Minneapolis to attend the Twins&8217; game.

One of those people, Brad Bjerke, said he was sitting in Hubert&8217;s Bar & Restaurant right across from the Metrodome when he found out about the bridge.

He said it must have been about 6:30 p.m. when the television station playing at the bar broke away from the game and started putting on live news of the collapse.

&8220;We were all in shock, but I wouldn&8217;t exactly say that I saw anybody panicking,&8221; Bjerke said. &8220;We were all concerned of course.&8221;

When he went into the game, he said, there were a lot of people around him talking on their cell phones to people about the collapse.

The announcer told the crowd the different roads and bridges that were closed e, and people were advised they should take alternate routes to get home.

Almost 25,000 were in attendance.

Bjerke said the drive home was easy with light traffic.