CNN reported that a Pittsburgh bridge collapsed on January 28, 2022. Four vehicles were on the bridge when they fell, and first responders had to use a rope to rappel down to get to the victims. Fortunately, there were no fatalities, and only ten people were injured.
CNN reported that the bridge failure happened just hours before President Biden visited the city.
During the President’s speech in the afternoon of the same day, he said:
“I’ve been coming to Pittsburgh a long time, and as a former Pennsylvanian … I didn’t realize that there are literally more bridges in Pittsburgh than in any other city in the world,” Biden said, adding, “We’re going to fix them all.”
“There’s 43,000 nationwide,” he said, referring to the number of bridges in poor condition across the country. “And we’re sending the money”, referring to the bipartisan infrastructure law.
Pittsburgh’s Action News reported that 14,500 vehicles passed the bridge daily, and the time the bridge collapsed at 6:39 AM may have prevented catastrophic damage.
Chief of Pittsburgh’s Bureau of Fire, Darryl Jones, says, “A half-hour later, the bridge would’ve been full with commuters’ vehicles going back and forth.” He said that the incident could have been a lot worse, and they are trying to determine what had caused the collapse.
According to the news, when the bridge collapsed, it dropped a city bus into a ravine requiring rescuers to rappel nearly 150 feet and form a human chain to reach the people inside the bus.
The bridge was in “poor” overall condition, according to a statewide listing of bridge conditions on the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation website. The report listed the deck condition as poor and said the substructure was satisfactory.
Initial investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board as to the cause of the collapse stated that:
The Fern Hollow bridge “experienced a structural failure” the initial report also describes the structure of the bridge, as “an uncoated weathering steel, three-span, continuous rigid “K” frame structure with two welded steel girders, welded steel floor beams, and rolled steel stringers.
“Although certain areas of the welded steel girders were identified as being fracture critical, no primary fractures were found in these areas.”
The NTSB report also says that the final report on the collapse could take more than a year.
The collapse of the Pittsburgh Fern Hollow bridge highlights America’s infrastructure woes.
We don’t think a lot about infrastructure until something goes wrong and fails to serve its purpose.
In this case, the collapse of a bridge is scary, but people who use it for their daily commute can’t help but wonder when the next event will be.
According to the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, one-third of the U.S. bridges need repairs or replacement, and seven percent of the nation’s bridges are deemed structurally deficient.
The problem could only worsen if infrastructure authorities delay maintenance or rehabilitation works.
The practice of Infrastructure Asset Management (IAM) can help governments optimize how they would spend the infrastructure stimulus money from the IIJA while ensuring financial sustainably.
Infrastructure asset management can help inform where the funding has the most significant impact, not just in the present but also in the future.
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