Imagine this.

It’s 1:29 a.m. on March 26, 2025. An airliner experiencing a power failure collides with the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, exactly one year after a container ship Dali knocked down the Key Bridge 30 miles to the north.

There is an immediate call for help, police and firefighters in Anne Arundel and Queen Anne’s counties are overwhelmed by the catastrophe, and state agencies quickly recognize the need for federal assistance.

In Annapolis, Gov. Wes Moore activates the National Guard and calls the White House.

President Donald Trump posts on his Truth Social network a few minutes later, “This is a bad situation that looks like it should have been prevented. NOT GOOD!!!”

The president’s communication staff says he will deliver remarks at 11 a.m.

“I put safety first. Obama, Biden and the Democrats put policy first,” Mr. Trump tells reporters gathered in the briefing room. “The FAA’s website states they include hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability, and dwarfism.”

“Brilliant people have to be in those positions.”

Challenged on his assessment of the cause, the president responds: “Because I have common sense.”

No airliner has crashed into the Bay Bridge. It seems unlikely.

But the president made those statements after another deadly disaster, the midair crash between an American Eagle passenger jet and an Army helicopter on Jan. 29 over the Potomac River near Washington, killing 67 people.

What a difference a year has made.

It’s 1:29 a.m. on March 26, 2024. The container ship Dali loses control and crashes into the steel supports of the Francis Scott Key Bridge at the outer reaches of the Port of Baltimore.

The 47-year-old bridge folds into the cold Patapsco River, killing six construction workers. Thousands of lives are disrupted, and the impact ripples through the Baltimore region.

What happened next was a remarkable story of how — after something went so tragically wrong — the response to calamity went amazingly right.

I’m not the only one thinking about how the Trump administration might respond to the next calamity.

“I worry a lot about that,” U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen said Thursday during a conversation with editors and reporters at The Banner. “You really did have everybody working in unison, right? It was Team USA working with Team Maryland as part of the unified command.”

Unity of effort is a key to an emergency response. As I’ve read The Banner’s continuing look back and academic reviews, the general assessment indicates this was a textbook example of how agencies should work together after a tragedy.

But I’ve also read news accounts of what’s happened to almost every agency involved since the Republican president took office and loosed his billionaire sidekick, Elon Musk, on an extra-constitutional tear through the federal government.

The attack is stunning.

The Coast Guard coordinated the unified response, centralizing efforts by 1,000 federal, state and local workers across two dozen agencies. Less than 24 hours after taking office, Trump fired the commandant, Adm. Linda L. Fagan, as part of his DEI inquisition.

Last week, Trump signed an executive order pushing more responsibility for disaster response to the states. He wants to dismantle the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“FEMA is a very expensive, in my opinion, mostly failed situation,” he said in January.

Trump barred the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and other federal watchdogs from making new rules, and Republicans in Congress want to eliminate an agency focused on workplace safety.

Trump’s speculation on the deadly Potomac River crash was unprecedented, sending a message to investigators at the National Transportation Safety Board. Its employees got intimidating emails from Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency.

The Army Corps of Engineers took less than three months to remove 50,000 tons of steel and concrete from the Fort McHenry channel. After the Los Angeles wildfires, Trump ordered the corps to release 2.2 billion gallons of water from dams — with zero effect on firefighting.

Hundreds have been laid off at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, including at the National Weather Service. Even the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration has been gutted.

There are more examples, but the point is clear. These changes were made in the name of efficiency, but they are instead about a different agenda.

“It’s gotten extremely, extremely political,” Van Hollen said.

As far as I know, the president has said nothing about the Key Bridge collapse. We should consider ourselves lucky.

Compare his response to the Potomac River crash with that of then-President Joe Biden hours after the Key Bridge collapse.

“To the people of Baltimore, I want to say: We’re with you. We’re going to stay with you as long as takes,” he said in the briefing room where Trump used his “common sense” to lay blame for the deaths of 67 people.

The contrast wasn’t lost on Van Hollen.

“It was a disgraceful scene, and I worry about another national disaster playing out in that situation,” the Maryland Democrat said.

Since those first months, Congress agreed to pay for a Key Bridge replacement.

In the preliminary NTSB report last week, investigators issued a damning critique of the Maryland Transportation Authority’s failure to assess the risks of a shipping collision at the bridge and address them.

This is how it should work.

Deal with the crisis. Prepare to rebuild. Work to prevent a recurrence of the tragedy.

I believe those who respond to the next disaster will do their best to live up to the standard set after the Key Bridge disaster.

I fear they will not have the leadership needed to do the job.