Whether they took place through human error, sabotage or unforeseen circumstances, these
structural failures are sure to make you feel nervous next time you're on a bridge.
Here are 7 of the worst bridge collapses in history.
Number 7: Yangmingtan Bridge The 15.4 km-long Yangmingtan Bridge is located
in the city of Harbin, Heilongjiang province, China.
It is the country’s longest bridge on the northern side of the Yangtze River.
Construction on the bridge began in 2009, and it was completed in only 18 months.
As Harbin’s first suspension bridge its total building cost was estimated at around
300 million dollars.
Even within the context of China’s fast growing infrastructure, the project was finished
so quickly that it received praises from the state media who called it a ‘Harbin miracle’
and a testament of ‘Harbin speed’.
On the 24th of August, 2012 at approximately 5 am, a section of the bridge measuring around
one hundred meters collapsed onto the footpath below it.
Four trucks carrying construction materials were on that particular portion of the bridge
when it collapsed.
It was suspected that their combined weight is what led to the structural failure.
One investigator concluded that the bridge had been overloaded.
On a ramp that was designed to support a maximum weight of 55 tons, the trucks’ added weight
measured close to 500 tons, almost ten times over the limit.
Early investigations established that the blame rested with the owners of the trucks
who had overloaded them but also with the traffic controllers for allowing the trucks
on the particular ramp simultaneously.
Three people lost their lives in the collapse and five others were injured, two of whom
reportedly arrived at the hospital in critical condition.
The collapse took place less than a year since the bridge was opened to traffic and the ramp
broke off from both sides.
This had encouraged speculations regarding significant safety and structural details
which had been overlooked or omitted in the rush to complete the project as fast as possible.
Number 6: The Seongsu Bridge Construction on this bridge, which stretched
over Seoul’s Han River, in South Korea, was completed in 1979.
It measures 1160 meters.
On the 21st of October, 1994, the bridge collapsed because of a suspension structure failure.
One of the concrete slabs fell as its support steel trusses had not been welded properly.
32 lives were lost in the accident.
17 people were injured.
Because of its overall weak structure, the Seongsu Bridge had to be completely rebuilt.
The design on a new bridge with the same name and a similar architectural style was completed
on the 15th of August 1997.
Number 5: The Sunshine Skyway Bridge Although it has been rebuilt the original
Sunshine Skyway Bridge, spanning Florida’s Tampa Bay, was first opened to traffic in
1954, on the 6th of September.
On the 9th of May 1980, at approximately 7:33 am, the MV Summit Venture freighter collided
with one of the bridge’s support columns.
The incident took place during a massive thunderstorm and caused more than 1200 feet of the bridge
to plummet into the Tampa Bay.
A Greyhound bus, six cars and a truck fell into the water from a height of 150 feet.
35 people lost their lives.
A man called Wesley MacIntire survived the massive drop as his pickup truck had initially
landed on the freighter’s deck, before falling into the water.
The man subsequently launched a lawsuit against the company that owned the Summit Venture
and in 1984 he settled for 175.000 dollars.
He was the last person that drove on the bridge’s original southern portion.
John Lerro, the ship’s pilot, was cleared from wrongdoing by the Coast Guard investigation
that followed.
He was also cleared in front of a state grand jury.
In 1993 all the concrete and steel structures of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge were demolished
as part of its rebuilding plan.
Number 4: The Silver Bridge The Silver Bridge was built in 1928 and its
name was due to the color of its aluminum paint coating.
It was an eyebar-chain suspension bridge that stretched over the Ohio River, connecting
Point Pleasant, North Virginia to Gallipolis, Ohio.
In 1967, on the 15th of December, the structure collapsed during rush-hour traffic which resulted
in the deaths of 46 people.
Two of them were never recovered.
The bridge collapsed due to overloading and the failure of one single eyebar in the suspension
chain.
Investigations revealed that the defect which had compromised the eyebar’s structural
integrity was only 0.1 inches deep and had been caused by corrosion.
The bridge’s design had also made maintenance and inspection rather difficult.
Engineering historian, Henry Petroski, described the factor behind the collapse as "a design
that inadvertently made inspection all but impossible and failure all but inevitable.
If ever a design was to blame for a failure, this was it".
The collapse was also linked to sightings of the Mothman, a Point Pleasant legendary
creature which had been spotted in the area from November 16th 1966 and up until the date
of the accident.
More than one hundred people had allegedly seen the Mothman between 1966 and 1967.
After the incident among the theories that emerged was one claiming that this creature
had shown itself as warning of the collapse that was to come.
Number 3: The Rafiganj Rail Disaster The Rafiganj rail disaster which claimed the
lives of at least 130 people was caused by a faulty colonial era bridge over North-Central
India’s Dhave River.
The Rajdhani Express, a train carrying more than one thousand people, derailed from the
300-foot-long bridge on the 10th of September, 2002, at approximately 10:40 pm.
The accident took place near the town of Rafiganj and fifteen of the train’s eighteen cars
fell from the tracks.
Two of them went into the river below, sealing the fates of the passengers trapped inside.
The powerful impact from the crash had also caused people from other carriages to be thrown
into the river.
The region’s poor roads hindered the efforts from rescuers and local military personnel.
The rainstorms which had occurred prior to the derailment had made the roads almost inaccessible.
By morning, with the aid of local people, around 125 passengers were pulled from the
river and taken to safety.
In the weeks that followed 130 bodies were recovered from the river.
However since more than 50 people were still missing it is believed that the actual death
toll is closer to 200.
Over 100 were injured in the derailment.
Several theories emerged after the accident regarding the factors behind it.
Many of them were focused on the faulty bridge which, as one railway employee reported, had
been seen as weak for a long time even before the incident.
Initially it was believed that metal fatigue and rust had caused the bridge’s structure
to shift, which in turn had caused the rails to crack.
Later reports revealed the absence of ‘fish plates’ which connected the rails to the
bridge, anchoring them.
Some investigators suggested sabotage.
The Naxalites, a Maoist terrorist group in the area who had been involved in guerilla
warfare, were suspected to have stolen the fish plates.
It was believed that they had done it in order to force an accident as revenge for their
leaders’ recent arrest.
However, the group never claimed responsibility for the alleged attack.
Number 2: The Stirling Bridge One of the earliest bridge collapses ever
documented took place during the Battle of Stirling Bridge on September 11, 1297.
The bridge was a narrow wooden structure over the River Forth, near Stirling Castle.
It served as a significant strategic point during the First War of Scottish Independence.
The Scottish forces lead by William Wallace and Andrew Moray confronted the combined English
forces of Hugh de Cressingham and the 6th Earl of Surrey, John de Warenne.
Even though the Scottish forces were outnumbered, they used the bridge as a tactical advantage.
Moray and Wallace waited for a significant number of English troops to advance on the
narrow structure.
Then the Scottish attack commenced.
Spearmen attacked from high ground, successfully fending off attacks from English heavy cavalry
before moving on to the infantry.
The Scots gained control on the eastern side of the bridge thus hampering the crossing
of any English reinforcements.
Historical accounts concerning the bridge’s collapse differ.
According to some chronicles, the Scots had sabotaged the structure of the bridge so that
it would collapse due to the weight of the advancing enemy troops.
Others claim that the bridge’s destruction was subsequently ordered by Surrey upon his
retreat.
The number of casualties is unknown but it is has been speculated that around 2000 English
troops were on the bridge when the Scots launched their attack.
In any case, Wallace and Moray were victorious in the Battle of Stirling Bridge and their
victory heavily rested on a strategy which had the bridge at its core.
Number 1: The Hyatt Regency Walkway In what is considered to be one of the deadliest
structural collapses in the history of the United States, this disaster claimed the lives
of 114 people and injured 216.
The incident took place on the 17th of July, 1981, at the Hyatt Regency Kansas City hotel
in Kansas City, Missouri.
The hotel was opened on the 1st of July 1980.
Its most distinctive features were the walkways which were suspended from the ceiling in the
hotel’s lobby.
They were made out of steel and glass each weighing around 64.000 pounds and measuring
around 120 feet.
The second level walkway was aligned directly below the fourth level walkway.
On July 17th, in the evening, approximately 1600 people had gathered in the hotel lobby
to watch and take part in a tea dance party.
At the same time 40 people were watching it from the second walkway. 16 to 20 people were
watching it from the fourth.
A design flaw concerning the support beams for the forth walkway and the steel tie rods
meant to carry the weight of both bridges made it barely possible for the structures
to stand on their own.
Once people started gathering on them, they became overloaded.
The fourth walkway collapsed onto the second one which then collapsed onto the party below.
Those who did not die instantly were trapped under over 60 tons of glass, steel and concrete.
The exhibition area on the ground floor was turned into an improvised morgue.
Kansas City’s response team for natural disasters was mobilized on the scene equipped
with earthmoving machines.
Cranes were brought at the site of the collapse to remove the pieces of walkway in order to
release the survivors.
In order to reach those trapped under the massive structures rescuers had to dismember
some of the dead bodies that were in the way.
A surgeon performed an emergency amputation on a man whose leg was trapped under an I-beam.
He performed the procedure using a chainsaw.
The hotel’s sprinkler’s system was also slowly flooding the lobby, and it could not
be stopped because it was not connected to a public source but to water tanks instead.
This placed the survivors at risk of drowning.
Mark Williams was the last person to be rescued alive from the wreckage.
After spending over nine hours with both legs out of their sockets, pinned under a large
piece from a lower skywalk he was almost about to drown.
Luckily, Kansas City’s fire chief noticed that the lobby’s doors were holding the
water inside.
The danger of drowning was eliminated when a bulldozer was sent to break through the
doors, letting the water out.
In the end, 29 people were rescued from the collapsed bridges.