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Six to 10 people killed in Florida foot bridge collapse -senator


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Six to 10 people killed in Florida foot bridge collapse -senator

By Zachary Fagenson

 

2018-03-15T201800Z_1_LYNXNPEE2E242_RTROPTP_4_FLORIDA-BRIDGE-COLLAPSE.JPG

Emergency crews work at the scene of a collapsed pedestrian bridge at Florida International University in Miami, Florida March 15, 2018 in this still image obtained from social media video. Instagram/ @BRANDONX868 via REUTERS

 

MIAMI (Reuters) - Six to 10 people were killed when a newly installed pedestrian bridge spanning several lanes of traffic collapsed at Florida International University on Thursday, U.S. Senator Bill Nelson of Florida told local TV station CBS Miami.

 

Emergency personnel searched for signs of life amid the wreckage of concrete, twisted metal and that rained from the collapsed structure and crushed vehicles on one of the busiest roads in South Florida.

 

2018-03-15T201800Z_1_LYNXNPEE2E243_RTROPTP_4_FLORIDA-BRIDGE-COLLAPSE.JPG

Emergency crews look for victims at the scene of a collapsed pedestrian bridge at Florida International University in Miami, Florida, U.S., March 15, 2018 in this still image from video. Courtesy of WTVJ-NBCMiami.com/Handout via REUTERS

 

The Florida Highway Patrol previously said several people were killed but did not release a figure on fatalities.

 

At least six injured people were taken away from the scene and eight vehicles were trapped in the bride wreckage, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez said in an interview with CBS Miami.

 

At one point, police had requested television helicopters to leave the area so rescuers could hear for any sounds of people crying for help from beneath the collapsed structure, the Miami TV station said.

 

2018-03-15T201800Z_1_LYNXNPEE2E246_RTROPTP_4_FLORIDA-BRIDGE-COLLAPSE.JPG

Emergency crews respond to the scene of a collapsed pedestrian bridge at Florida International University in Miami, Florida, U.S., March 15, 2018 in this image obtain from social media. Instagram/ @barbituriinsua via REUTERS

 

Munilla Construction Management, which installed the bridge, in a statement on Twitter, said the bridge suffered a “catastrophic collapse causing injuries and loss of life."

 

Complicating the rescue effort was the uncertainty about the integrity of the bridge, parts of which remained off the ground, much of it inclined, local media reported.

 

The bridge connects the university with the city of Sweetwater and was installed on Saturday in six hours over the eight-lane highway, according to a story that was posted on the university's website. It was 174 feet (53 m) long and weighed 950 tons.

 

The bridge was intended to provide a walkway over southwest Eighth Street, one of the busiest roads in South Florida. An 18-year-old female FIU student from San Diego was killed while trying to cross the street near FIU last August, according to local media reports.

 

Students at FIU are currently on their spring break vacation, which runs from March 12 to March 17.

 

Television footage showed firefighters were walking across the flattened wreckage and medics treating injured people. Emergency personnel appeared to be trying to work their way through a hole in the top of the bridge.

 

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said President Donald Trump is aware of the collapse.

 

"Our brave first responders are working feverishly to save lives," she said at a news briefing.

 

Florida Governor Rick Scott will head to the scene later in the day, his office said.

 

The National Transportation Safety Board said on Twitter that it was sending a team to investigate the bridge collapse.

 

Munilla Construction Management was founded in 1983 and owned by five brothers, according to its website. In addition to its Florida operations, the company also has divisions in Texas and Panama and employs 500 people.

 

(Reporting by Gina Cherelus, Joseph Ax, Daniel Wallis and Andrew Hay in New York, Scott Malone in Boston, Bernie Woodall in Fort Lauderdale and James Oliphant in Washington; Writing by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

 
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-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-03-16
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The darn thing was just recently installed.  Way back in 1975 right outside my class room high school window, I watched a big garbage truck with one of those container lifting hookups hit the pedestrian overpass and knock it down.  Nobody got hurt.

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2 hours ago, dcutman said:

Its either a serious engineering miscalculation in the respect the bridge was no where near completion or gross negligence on the contractors part. The rendering show several (5 or 6) suspension cables for this section and photos before the collapse show no cables or temporary shoring.  I find it hard to believe the engineer missed it this badly that the bridge could not support itself without temporary mid span support. Possibly the contractor or sub contractor loaded the unsupported bridge with materials without engineers approval?

 
Image result for Florida International University pedestrian bridge

 

Reading one of the USA sites it seems the structure is not 100% stable until all the final supports are installed. I take from that the temporary supports may not have been up to the job. 

Lots of questions to be answered on this. How 'green' was the concrete, was it one continous pour or interupted pour causing a weak area. Was the re-bar the correct size/grade plus a good few other things to check.

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It lasted five (5) days?

 

"Accelerated Bridge Construction"

 

"An Engineering Marvel"

 

Hopefully the contractor is bidding on The Wall.

 

 

Florida bridge in fatal collapse was touted as an engineering marvel

 

The FIU-Sweetwater UniversityCity Bridge was supposed to be an engineering marvel.

 

Five days before the bridge collapsed onto a busy eight-lane road, crushing several vehicles and killing at least four people, Florida International University (FIU) issued a press release trumpeting the cutting-edge techniques used to install the 95-ton pedestrian walkway.

 

“On March 10, the main span of the FIU-Sweetwater UniversityCity Bridge was lifted from its temporary supports, rotated 90 degrees across an eight-lane thoroughfare, and lowered into its permanent position,” read the release, which was accompanied by tweets featuring video of the procedure.

 

https://globalnews.ca/news/4085865/fiu-bridge-collapse-construction-engineering/

 

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3 hours ago, overherebc said:

 

Reading one of the USA sites it seems the structure is not 100% stable until all the final supports are installed. I take from that the temporary supports may not have been up to the job. 

Lots of questions to be answered on this. How 'green' was the concrete, was it one continous pour or interupted pour causing a weak area. Was the re-bar the correct size/grade plus a good few other things to check.

"crews were conducting a stress test on the bridge Thursday"

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article205422719.html

Looks like final approval for use hadn't been made.

And that the underlying area hadn't been cleared during the test period that may have improperly over-stressed the design or construction failed the designed stresses. In either case I suspect the stress tests require a day or more (ie., for "creep" stresses) that would have blocked underneath traffic.

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19 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

"crews were conducting a stress test on the bridge Thursday"

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article205422719.html

Looks like final approval for use hadn't been made.

And that the underlying area hadn't been cleared during the test period that may have improperly over-stressed the design or construction failed the designed stresses. In either case I suspect the stress tests require a day or more (ie., for "creep" stresses) that would have blocked underneath traffic.

Think the article mentioned it wouldn't be open for use for another good few months as well.

Seems strange as well that traffic wasn't stopped during testing.

Edited by overherebc
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2 hours ago, mtls2005 said:

It lasted five (5) days?

 

"Accelerated Bridge Construction"

 

"An Engineering Marvel"

 

Hopefully the contractor is bidding on The Wall.

 

 

Florida bridge in fatal collapse was touted as an engineering marvel

 

The FIU-Sweetwater UniversityCity Bridge was supposed to be an engineering marvel.

 

Five days before the bridge collapsed onto a busy eight-lane road, crushing several vehicles and killing at least four people, Florida International University (FIU) issued a press release trumpeting the cutting-edge techniques used to install the 95-ton pedestrian walkway.

 

“On March 10, the main span of the FIU-Sweetwater UniversityCity Bridge was lifted from its temporary supports, rotated 90 degrees across an eight-lane thoroughfare, and lowered into its permanent position,” read the release, which was accompanied by tweets featuring video of the procedure.

 

https://globalnews.ca/news/4085865/fiu-bridge-collapse-construction-engineering/

 

The techniques used to install the bridge were nothing to do with the collapse of the bridge, and were apparently cutting edge.

 

As already pointed out, it would seem that they had omitted to install the support cables, which will no doubt be a significant part of the disaster.

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19 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

The techniques used to install the bridge were nothing to do with the collapse of the bridge, and were apparently cutting edge.

 

As already pointed out, it would seem that they had omitted to install the support cables, which will no doubt be a significant part of the disaster.

Some reports from USA are saying they were tightening the cables when it collapsed !!!

Other reports that cracks were noticed but the report on them was done by voicemail and was 'missed'????

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3 hours ago, overherebc said:

Some reports from USA are saying they were tightening the cables when it collapsed !!!

Other reports that cracks were noticed but the report on them was done by voicemail and was 'missed'????

Don't know which cables they might be. From the pictures on tv there is no evidence of any support cables or pylon.

I did hear mention of temporary supports in place.

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2 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Don't know which cables they might be. From the pictures on tv there is no evidence of any support cables or pylon.

I did hear mention of temporary supports in place.

It will be while before the whole truth comes out.

Google Bridge collapse USA.

Lots of reports photos videos etc to sort through.

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6 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Don't know which cables they might be. From the pictures on tv there is no evidence of any support cables or pylon.

I did hear mention of temporary supports in place.

It may be post-tension cables embedded in the concrete as opposed to suspension cables to carry the weight of the span.

http://www.concreteconstruction.net/how-to/construction/post-tensioned-slabs_o

 

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5 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

It may be post-tension cables embedded in the concrete as opposed to suspension cables to carry the weight of the span.

http://www.concreteconstruction.net/how-to/construction/post-tensioned-slabs_o

 

Sounds right. Would fit with 'fast consruction' being quoted.

Pre-tensioned would require specially constructed casting beds more suited to production of many bits of the same shape.

Perhaps unequal forces on the ends of different lengths of the steel being tensioned would cause distortion and cracking or exceeding the max load on one or more would cause problems. Just thinking on the lines of todays 'minimal material required to comply' mindset.

Edited by overherebc
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4 hours ago, overherebc said:

Sounds right. Would fit with 'fast consruction' being quoted.

Pre-tensioned would require specially constructed casting beds more suited to production of many bits of the same shape.

Perhaps unequal forces on the ends of different lengths of the steel being tensioned would cause distortion and cracking or exceeding the max load on one or more would cause problems. Just thinking on the lines of todays 'minimal material required to comply' mindset.

Reset...

 

IMG_2533.JPG

Edited by Grouse
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2 minutes ago, Grouse said:

Not my line but no sign of post- tension cables. I guess we'll find out. Appears pre stressed to my untrained eye.

Not sure. Pre-stressed would require a custom made casting mold which would be a one off expense and to my mind that doesn't really fit with 'fast construction.' But as I say, not sure.

Strangest thing to me is the not stopping traffic while testing is going on.

I suupose on that line I'm thinking of pressure testing/leak testing where a big area was cleared around and I was the only daft guy who would end up close to the unit checking things. ??? but that was my job etc. ££££££ ?

I feel for the sad loss of lives but I am quite interested in what went wrong.

As I said in a previous post I could never get my head around the idea of minimal material used to conform to the required specification. I know it's financial but I also feel well meaning engineers are forced to comply because the bean counters now run construction projects.

 

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51 minutes ago, Grouse said:

Reset...

 

IMG_2533.JPG

If you look at some the photos on the various USA sites you'll see that is a model of the 'completed' bridge and those support cables were not yet part of it. The opening time for the bridge and completion was sometime in the future, a good few months in the future. The walkway was being tested prior to those cables being fitted.

Google  Bridge collapse USA and there is a clip now showing the actual collapse somewhere in there.

Edited by overherebc
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20 hours ago, Grouse said:

Reset...

 

IMG_2533.JPG

While the overhead suspension cables apparently were not yet in place, they would still have to have cables through the concrete itself.

I've never seen a design like that before, so it could be a radically new design that just didn't work like it was supposed to. The answer will come out, eventually, of course, and in the meanwhile the lawyers will be busy busy busy.

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52 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

While the overhead suspension cables apparently were not yet in place, they would still have to have cables through the concrete itself.

I've never seen a design like that before, so it could be a radically new design that just didn't work like it was supposed to. The answer will come out, eventually, of course, and in the meanwhile the lawyers will be busy busy busy.

The angle parts of the trusses must have had through length cables to attach to the stay cables. Only guessing but if one let go during tensioning and the concrete cracked you could end up with a domino effect.

Re' lawyers, the adding machines will be overheating already. ??

Edited by overherebc
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