No.
While the anchor would have likely been long enough to touch bottom (drawing 40’ in a 50’ channel), it would have been ineffective. A 100KT ship already moving at just over 7kts is not going to stop on a dime or run a slalom course with lives at stake atop the slalom gates. Had the anchor bit immediately, it would not have had any effect great enough to stop the collision. The distance required to stop that vessel would be a few miles.
Considering the pilot radioed a mayday advising of loss of propulsion/steerage leading to a possible collision, the few hands on board would likely not have made it in time to manually release the anchor, should there have even been enough hands available to do the job, because they were handling bigger issues while already close to the bridge.
I’m not a mariner, but several in my dad’s family were, and I got the safety briefings when it came to swimming and boating in Mobile Bay and showing due caution and respect for the shipping channel, i.e. “big boats can kill like big trains, here’s how.”
