WASHINGTON, April 15 (Reuters) - The FBI said on Monday

it opened a criminal probe into the collapse of a Baltimore

bridge in March when a ship crashed into a bridge support, while

local officials confirmed the recovery of a fourth body from the

incident.

FBI agents boarded the cargo ship Dali to conduct

court-authorized law enforcement activity regarding the crash,

an FBI spokesperson said. The spokesperson said there was no

other public information available and the bureau will have no

further comment.

The body of a fourth victim was recovered on Monday after

divers spotted what they believed to be a missing construction

vehicle, inside which they found the body, the Key Bridge

Unified Command said in a statement. Details surrounding the

victim's identity were not made public at the request of family.

The Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed into the Patapsco

River in the early morning of March 26, killing six men who were

working on the span at the time, after the massive container

ship lost power and crashed into a support pylon. The bodies of

two victims are still missing.

The investigation into the collapse will focus in part on

whether the crew of the Dali left the port knowing the freighter

had serious problems with its systems, the Washington Post

reported earlier.

Safety investigators have recovered the ship's "black box"

recorder, which provides data on its position, speed, heading,

radar, and bridge audio and radio communications, as well as

alarms.

The city of Baltimore said on Monday it hired two law firms

- DiCello Levitt and Saltz Mongeluzzi Bendesky Trial Lawyers -

as it considered litigation against the owner, charterer and

operator of the ship.

The registered owner of the Singapore-flagged ship is

Grace Ocean Pte Ltd. Synergy Marine Group managed the ship and

Maersk chartered the vessel.

The head of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board

separately told Congress last week that its investigators had

interviewed key cargo ship personnel as part of its probe.

Work to clear the wreckage and restore traffic through the

Baltimore port's shipping channel continues.

Replacing the bridge will likely take years, but authorities

have opened two temporary channels to allow some shallow-draft

vessels to move around the stricken container vessel. The U.S.

Army Corps of Engineers said two weeks ago that it expected to

open a new channel to the Port of Baltimore by the end of April.

When the crash occurred, the Dali was leaving Baltimore en

route to Colombo, Sri Lanka, with a crew of 21, plus two pilots

on board to guide it out of the port.

The same ship was involved in an incident in the port of

Antwerp, Belgium, in 2016, when it hit a quay as it tried to

exit a North Sea container terminal.

An inspection in June 2023 carried out in San Antonio,

Chile, found the vessel had propulsion and auxiliary machinery

deficiencies, according to data on the public Equasis website,

which provides information on ships.

According to Singapore's Maritime and Port Authority, the

vessel passed foreign-port inspections last June and September.