Howard Frankland Bridge

The Howard Frankland Bridge carries Interstate 275 between St. Petersburg, Florida and Tampa, Florida across Old Tampa Bay.

Significance

The bridge is the focal point of a notable and often joked-about incident involving members of the USS Khai Tam.

Backstory

While attending a Vulkon in St. Petersburg, Khai Tam crew members Kevin McNulty, George Sumpter, Jon Carney, Scott Campbell, and Colin Toenjes left from the convention hotel in St. Petersburg for a "shore leave party" seeking entertainment opportunities in Tampa. The type of opportunities for which one should possess large amounts of one dollar bills.

The away team set out with directions in hand from the brother of another shipmate who lived in Tampa. Unfortunately, the directions seemed to omit critical details about the exit structure of the Tampa end of the bridge.

Crossing the Howard Frankland Bridge, they missed their exit on the Tampa side, and turned around at the next exit, intending to go back to their original intended highway exit. Not being familiar with the area led to the crew getting back on the bridge headed back to St. Pete.

The team turned around in St. Pete and headed back over the bridge, this time trying a similar but different exit. This brought them to Tampa International Airport. Trying to find their way back at least to the bridge so they could retrace their steps, they left the airport. Unfortunately, due to construction, they ended up having to go back across the Howard Frankland Bridge to the St. Petersburg side again, turn around, and recross the bridge.

The Howard Frankland Bridge is over three miles in length. Each crossing, plus the time required for turning around, delayed the beginning of the evening's festivities significantly, much to the dismay of the shore leave party members.

As such, any time this bridge was crossed by members of the original group while attending subsequent events in Tampa, particularly while on "shore leave party" missions, it was referred to as "the (expletive) Howard Frankland Bridge."

Related Links

• Howard Frankland Bridge at Wikipedia