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China Bridge Fails

China Bridge Fails

RE: China Bridge Fails

I am not sure if this is the bridge designed by TY Lin international.  An article about this kind of bridges appeared in last months Civil Engineering magazine.  This kind of bridge is a hybid between regular girder bridge and cable stayed.

RE: China Bridge Fails

The responsible party will no doubt be invited to commit suicide.

This is a wakeup alarm for all those who were too eager to place their work in china. Today's news told about massive recalls of chinese toys marketed by major US toy mfrs.

RE: China Bridge Fails

Yeah, thinking about liability insurance must be pretty high in China, what does it take to avoid the death penalty?

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

RE: China Bridge Fails

This is one of China's bridges for their own people (and tourists), and is there any wonder about the other "products" you buy from China?  But, that's another topic for another forum.

Sorry, but no surprises here.

Mike McCann
McCann Engineering

RE: China Bridge Fails

From the Yahoo Article:

"An editorial in the official China Daily on Tuesday warned that thousands of the country's bridges were unsafe. "If left unrepaired these bridges may crumble at any time, wreaking economic havoc and possibly claiming human lives," it said.""

Notcie how economic havoc was more important than a few human lives.

RE: China Bridge Fails

But you can get one at Wally World for $ 19.95 !!.....More seriously I wonder about the quality of the big dam they built ??

RE: China Bridge Fails

"At least 123 workers were at the site of the arched concrete bridge"

That doesn't sound like cable stayed/girder.

I don't know that this particular incident says anything about China specifically.  We've had US bridges collapse during construction (generally on smaller scale), recently had a post about some building floors collapsing during construction.  That's a problem, but not necessarily a design problem in the finished structure.

RE: China Bridge Fails

Bribes or blood money, I don't know that China has that system but some places do.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

RE: China Bridge Fails

To quote Charlton Heston...  "Flesh and blood makes poor mortar."  - The Ten Commandments

(I may have tweeked this a bit here)

Mike McCann
McCann Engineering

RE: China Bridge Fails

1)The bridge is a concrete (or CMU?) arch bridge, which is a traditional bridge system used in China. They are still trying to figure out what went wrong. But I do not appreciate the attitude to quickly jump to criticize all the construction works (and other products) done in China. I am sure there are many poor construction projects in China due to inadequate design, poor construction, and so on. But I am also pretty sure that the design and construction of many other projects are excellent, including the big dam. China is now similar to the stage US used to be several decades ago when the economy started to boom. Read a little bit history and you will find a lot of similar stories by then.
2)TY Lin international is an excellent firm. The hybrid bridge system is a simple but good idea for bridges with short or medium spans. I like this idea.

RE: China Bridge Fails

rt06, my comments were aimed at the legal/regulatory system.

If I recall correctly wasn't the head of the food safety agency convicted of negligence or something recently in light of some of the food scares etc and wasn't he sentenced to death?

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

RE: China Bridge Fails

To elaborate a bit on rt06's comments. China's educational system & technical skills suffered during the Cultural Revolution, so even now many growing pains in its fast-developing economy. It wasn't until 1984 that Deng Xiaoping said "To get rich is glorious" and allowed significant private entrepreneurship. The genie was let out of the bottle in an country in which companies had hitherto been run by the government/Red Army without regard to quality or consumer safety or pollution. Ergo, lots of development, robber barons and corrupt officials. For many years, the Chinese government kept disasters secret.  Significantly, the the state-controlled media as quoted above is not only acknowledging them, but pointing out widespread safety problems in coal mines, factories and building sites. It's a subtle way of using public opinion to rein in corrupt contractors and bribe-taking officials.

RE: China Bridge Fails

There's still plenty of corruption in the USA. I've seen plenty of substandard engineering done by low-ball firms that could care less what happens down the road, as long as they make a profit today.

RE: China Bridge Fails

bridgebuster,

I haven't read the full article from which you quote "wreaking economic havoc and possibly claiming human lives" but from that sentence I don't see that there is any suggestion that the economic havoc would be more important than the loss of life.

RE: China Bridge Fails

Zambo - shouldn't preserving life come first?

In seismic bridge design, the philosophy is "no collapse", meaning we're not worried if the bridge will be rendered unusable, we just don't want it to collapse and  injure or kill someone.

Granted, when a facilty is destroyed it creates economic havoc - case in point: The World Trade Center.

But what's more important?

RE: China Bridge Fails

Yeah.. dont think everything made in china is bad.  Thats what most people think of things that were made in Japan several decades ago.  If I had to guess, it is foundation / slope issue. Looks very devastating.  None of the piers were still standing.

Never, but never question engineer's judgement

RE: China Bridge Fails

unclesyd -

I noticed that as well in the pictures attached to the first posted article. The columns seem to have it, but the spans don't.  I was hoping it was just the pictures were from too far away to see it, but from the article you posted - maybe not.

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