The picture doesn't exactly look like a "new" bridge.

There was something done to it: http://myrm.info/333/notices/dyck-memorial-bridge/ From the picture in the OP's link, I would guess they replaced the original pilings, but keep the roadway. The entire job took barely a month.

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Yea,

http://www.demolitioncentral.com/bid_opportunities...

Bids due June 12. Open September 14

"it wasn't structurally faulty." So was it sub-structurally faulty?

My glass has a v/c ratio of 0.5

Maybe the tyranny of Murphy is the penalty for hubris. - http://xkcd.com/319/

It would appear that the visible piling shifted away from the joint it was supporting.

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>>>Hicks called it an “act of God,” insisting the bridge was built to standard.

“Something underneath the riverbed just gave way,<<<

“It wasn’t structurally faulty. The fault is in what God did under the river.”

I don't think God had anything to do with it. Sounds like someone didn't bother with drilling any boreholes to find out what they were founding the piles on...

"It would appear that the visible piling shifted away from the joint it was supporting."

The pier seems to have sunk several feet, so the center span wasn't long enough to reach the pier cap anymore.

Root cause found:

“They (the engineering and construction contractor) don’t know if there’s an air or gas pocket or underground river or whatever,”

You can almost see them Duke boys coming down the road :D



Seriously though. Those steel girders look a bit narrow. Should an old multi-span bridge like that rely on the shear strength and integrity of the beams at the supports?

Those look like concrete box beams to me.

Edit: Sorry, were you referring to the pier caps? Those do look a bit narrow as a seat for the beams.

I was sure it's not April yet.

That sure looks like the old bridge. "Timber substructure with concrete girders" is how the old structure is described on the demolition site and that description fits the picture.

Article says a 15 foot span?

BS. The writer's dyslexic!

I see what l;ooks like wood framing, but can't be sure... and would not make sense. Must be the coloring.

Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)

The RFP stipulates that the roadway could potentially be reused, while the main objective was to replace the wooden pilings

In any case, sounds like there's at least one PE about to lose their license.

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I don't see anything that suggests the road or bridge deck was touched in any way recently.

How do you drive a pile from under an existing bridge?

Or do you think they just rested the thing on the creek bed and called it good?

"How do you drive a pile from under an existing bridge?"

Maybe that is the problem; if they left the roadway in place, they couldn't have driven any new pilings and everything might possibly be sitting on the original, wooden pilings, and the new ones slid off the old ones. That would a bankrupt-inducing suit in the making. If they removed the roadbed and drove new pilings, that would be different.

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It sure looks like something shifted the bottoms of the steel pilings out farther into the stream - they don't look vertical anymore, as if they were set on a single submerged block that rotated. I am impressed that the diagonals held them all together and they remained in one plane.

The photo shows a ridiculously undersized pile cap. Not saying it isn't "strong" enough... it is too small, specifically the flange width of steel section. A (concrete) pile cap for a bridge of that size should be double or triple the width of that flange. The end of the span that fell is likely the expansion end and was not anchored (by design) to the pile cap. Probably slipped off, perhaps bending the flange, got wedged in place, slowly "pushed" the pile bent out of the way, then collapsed.

Steel section was probably used for the pile cap, instead of concrete, to lower costs.

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Is that a layer of gravel on top of the concrete?
If so, that could have increased the loading on the piles.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

It looks to me like the remaining section of roadway on the far side of the creek is hanging out over the pilings cap (toward the middle of the creek, where did the piece that fell sit) on the down stream side. ???

Although the second pilling from the left looks as if the concrete roadway beam slide down the pilling possible pushing it outward toward the creek bank. Same for the far left one.

It seems to me that both piers shifted sideways, but that could have been the result of the collapse of the center span, rather than the cause of it. Extrapolate the line of the top of the deck for the near span in the picture, and it becomes obvious that the near-side pier is a few feet lower than where it should be, as was stated in the story (granted, that may be the only thing they got right). When it sunk, the distance between the pier caps increased, and the beams slid off the seats.

If there's anything impressive about this bridge it's that Macadam-like overlay that has stuck so well to the boxes. Anyone know exactly what that is?

The overlay looks like just compacted crushed base or crusher run. It may have some cement mixed in, but it interlocks fairly well even without that. Sometimes an adhesive membrane, similar to the ice & water shield used for roofing, is used over the top of precast concrete sections, although I don't see any evidence of it in the pictures.

Undoubtedly the pile bent(pier)settled. Note the cross bracing elevation at the water line difference between the two piers showing the near one has settled significantly. My guess is these pipe piers were made by jacking pipe sections down, one at a time with the existing bridge as the reaction load. Could be the jack was not accurately calibrated and maybe way undersized. The "pile cap" WF section has not bent or distorted due to excessive loading by the jack. These piles were not preloaded to any degree. Of course maybe there was no jacking.

Yes, obviously a failure by settlement. Also obvious that it was the result of a total lack of any subsurface investigation whatsoever. Blaming God for not creating something solid to hold it up was a nice touch, though.

I'm kinda with IRstuff on this one. If the new piers were placed at the same location as the old ones then there would have been pile conflicts. Possibly they cut the old piles off below the waterline and attempted to tie into them with new piers and cap beam. Then the new piers slipped off. Perhaps the old piles were heavily affected by scour and the new piers were tied in off-center applying an eccentric load which failed them.

Otherwise I have trouble understanding the sudden and immediate failure of continuous piles under the same reaction loads that were used to press them.

Here is a photo of the bridge before failure. Note that pile bracing connections are far above water level. Pile bent must have settled uniformly not to bend the x-bracing. Also, in the "after failure" photo the the bracing connections to piling are underwater, as OG mentioned... must have been many feet of settlement before the span slipped of the pile cap.



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News update

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/bridge...

That report states this is company: http://www.inertiasolutions.ca/inspection.html

Another report: https://www.on-sitemag.com/bridges/new-bridge-coll...

Identifies a different company: http://www.can-struct.ca/ (without much of a web site)

And here https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/clayton-r... we are told that "Construction and design were handled by Can-Struct Systems and Inertia Solutions, which have the same owner."

The Reeve (President) of the RM of Clayton Duane Hicks says the bridge that collapsed six hours after it opened was constructed without having a geotechnical investigation executed on the riverbed it stood on. “Effectively the actual fact of the matter is we do not have a heck of some huge cash,” mentioned Hicks.

In response to Sasktenders, the bridge contract was price $325,000. Hicks mentioned it is troublesome to justify an enormous finances for this bridge, which he estimated would have about 1,000 autos crossing it yearly.

Hicks mentioned he’d wish to see the brand new bridge accomplished inside the subsequent three to 4 weeks, although he acknowledges that will not be life like.

Link

So, they decided to save some money by neglecting to investigate what would be holding up the bridge; the phrase "penny wise and dollar foolish" comes to mind. Will replacing the entire bridge, as will be necessary now, be less expensive than a foundation investigation would have been?

Bimr... what language/dialect are they speaking in the quotes in that article??? Is there any video of this interview?

“I do not know who in charge however I determine God constructed most of this for us.”

“the entire 5 of them simply went straight down. Increase. 4 toes.”

“So one thing tells me that one thing beneath the bottom occurred. I do not know what it was. They do not know what it was. No person is aware of what it’s.”

“You’ll be able to’t drill by way of water,” he mentioned. “You’ll be able to’t do it. You’ll be able to’t take underground samples.”

“Effectively the actual fact of the matter is we do not have a heck of some huge cash,”

“They’ll go down deeper. And simply hold taking place and down and down,” he mentioned. “I do not know what I may ask them to do in a different way fairly frankly.”

Some sort of stream of consciousness, or just BAD reporter note-taking

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Quote (Spartan5 (Civil/Environmental) )

Bimr... what language/dialect are they speaking in the quotes in that article??? Is there any video of this interview?

Was wondering the same thing myself. My initial thought was that it was Red Green's hometown of Possum Lake, Canada.
"Thet Canada" colorful description of the bridge failure

Supporters of the Saskatchewan Roughriders:



The article in the link describes some words and phrases that appear to be unique to Saskatchewan.

Saskatchewans Distinct Dialect

Incidentally, Eng Tips' own favourite Norwegian Uncle, dik (Structural) lives prit’near there. Heard that he has a nice dugout’ in a person’s ‘back forty’ off a goat trail in Manitoba, maybe as near as 500 kilometers away from Saskatchewan. Maybe he can elucidate.

The original report by mint julep is in English with the same quotes. The one in the link looks like someone used a speech to text app and hasn't edited it.

Looks like they skipped the mid stream geo tech because it was too expensive.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

Sounds like Jim Bob hired his cousin Joe Bob and Joe Bob's cousin/brother-in-law to build a bridge...

Just wasn't skookum enough.

Looks like a failure waiting to happen, which did.

It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts. (Sherlock Holmes - A Scandal in Bohemia.)

Luckily, the failure didn't wait to happen...

Those quotes are beyond ridiculous and have obviously been Google translated from the French version. They don't match the original story.

Quote (charliealphabravo (Structural) )

Those quotes are beyond ridiculous and have obviously been Google translated from the French version. They don't match the original story.

Maybe ridiculous, but if you review the minutes of meetings, the local people do seem to have a different grasp of English.

Minutes of Meetings

Dyck Memorial Bridge Warning

I read on a facebook post that they used screw piles. Even without a geotech you should be able to get an idea of the capacity by getting the torque reading. That is, assuming you have someone that has a basic understanding. Seems they hired some real geniuses here. We looked at one collapse involving screw piles and discovered they merely put in the lengths they had and went home. That structure also settled 4'-0" before the bottom the structure sat on the ground. During the demolition we found the torque was something like 9,000ft*lb when we first started to remove the piles. It should have been in excess of 40,000ft*lb.

From the warning linked above: "...unfortunately something under the riverbed failed, that could not have been anticipated."

Really? No way to anticipate several feet of settlement? Heck, a simple rod driving test would have likely sufficed to tell them that much. An actual subsurface investigation by a qualified geotech could probably have estimated it within an inch or less. Am I right geotech guys?

Edit: Obviously, I don't mean estimating the 4' of settlement to an inch or less, but the settlement for a properly sized foundation with adequate capacity...

If helical piers were used then that raises more questions. Helical piers imply a pinned connection below the waterline as opposed to a continuous pile with base fixity. Lateral resistance could be much less in the absence of a pile cap system and battered piers. Were the original piles pulled up thereby disturbing the subsurface integrity? Were the piers placed adjacent to the original piles thereby incorporating an eccentric load on the piers? How was bearing capacity determined? A correlation with torque may not be sufficient in the absence of geotechnical guidance.

By my estimation of the sophistication of this operation, I seriously doubt they would know what a helical pier/pile was, much less have the knowledge or equipment to install them.

Charlie, I agree the torque is only a part of the problem. I am not totally sold on your pin theory. Short term, yes, but long term much of the helix disturbance settles. This failure was short term, so that very well could turn out to be part of the problem. That said, the failure appears to be largely a vertical settlement, so it seems to me that the soil block around the helix(s) sheared and then the bridge settled until segments started falling off. The resistance contribution from shaft resistance for vertical loads is usually virtually inconsequential for these small diameter piles.

There will be thousands of hopper bottom grain bins near this bridge that are supported on screw piles. That is farming country, and screw piles are cost effective, fast and practical for the clay soils. The common load to the leg of many of those bins is between 40,000 - 100,000lb. It is very common to put a single pile at each leg. They will have contractors that have a basic (maybe good) understanding of screw piles. The unique aspect about bins is they see the full design loads many times each year, unlike other structures that may or may not see the full design load. The mere size of the rig needed to reach out to install the pier piles suggests they had a rig that should have been capable of generating reasonable torque values.

Clearly a Diode Bridge.

You can cross it but only in the one direction.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

I had to look at that for a minute, then I realised you're considering it as an electron would, not a hole.

A.

IS:

Great comment... had to take a second look. Originally thought it was a barrier.

Dik

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAKksqKR3pI

Rubes in Hickville build a bridge and it collapses.
College professor in Italy builds a state-of-the-art bridge and it collapses.
Professional bridge engineers in Florida build a bridge and it collapses.

Rubes in Hickville fail to do soil investigation and the bridge sinks.
Experienced geotechnical engineers in S. Padre Island spend thousands on soil investigations and the building sinks.
Experienced geotechnical engineers in California spend gazillions on soil investigations and the building sinks.

I'm not sure what the moral is in all this, though.

Edit: Now that I think about it, these folks accomplished a better safer quicker cheaper and less painful failure, there should be some kind of award for that.

Catch the link:

https://www.on-sitemag.com/bridges/no-geotech-stud...

Quote (dik (Structural))

Catch the link:

https://www.on-sitemag.com/bridges/no-geotech-stud...

It's déjà vu all over again as Canada Press stated that almost a week ago (20 Sep 18 22:23) :

www.canadapressit.com/bridge-that-collapsed-six-hours-after-opening-was-built-without-geotech-investigation-of-riverbed-reeve

Interesting announcement on their website from when the bridge re-opened 2 weeks ago:

Quote (http://myrm.info/333/dyck-memorial-bridge/)

The Dyck Memorial bridge is now completed and open, but please be careful as it is a new construction and the approach will still settle.

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Hopefully not 4 feet this time!

I think I'll avoid that span for some time.

----------------------------------------

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It looks like a 13-km detour to get to Swan Plain without that bridge, but there does seem to be alternative paths for most people in that RM.

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“It wasn’t structurally faulty. The fault is in what God did under the river.”
I wonder if blaming an act of God will have serious negative insurance coverage implications?

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

An act of god is an inevitable, unpredictable, and unreasonably severe event caused by natural forces without any human interference, and over which an insured party has no control, such as an earthquake, flood, hurricane, lightning, snowstorm. Acts of God are insurable accidents and valid excuses for non-performance of a contract.

The reeve of the RM of Clayton, Duane Hicks is obviously not an attorney and obviously confused.

On the one hand, he claims that it was an act of god, which if true would take the Contractor off the hook. The next minute, he claims that the bridge is under warranty and the Contractor will repair/replace at no cost to the community. Both of these statements can't be true.

An attorney would probably advise him to stop speaking about the Contract.

The final outcome of this incident will depend on whatever is in the Contract. Based on the comments made so far by the reeve, one would not have much confidence in his ability to prepare a proper construction contract.

Maybe the contractor is god.

Any place that I've been the inspector is God.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

god specializes in damns not bridges.

Screw piles are ubiquitous on the prairies.
The contractor may have done hundreds of screw piles without a geo-tech survey.
The other piles are still giving good service.
Why not these?
It always worked before.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

No lesson learned?

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/munici...

• https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/municipality-where-bridge-colla

I keep wondering if I have somehow been magically transported to the Jokes thread.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

For some reason, I can't help thinking about Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nU2y6ztlMAQ

http://julianh72.blogspot.com

A facts-be-damned decision.

"testing would take weeks and weeks...the delay would be months"
So lets try take #2 and see if this one holds up for a couple days...

This is starting to remind me of a tagline that I have seen attributed to Albert Einstein;
Paraphrased,
The definition of insanity is repeating the same action and hoping for a different result.

Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter

This quote pretty much sums up the attitude & intelligence of the RM of Clayton administrator Kelly Rea "... there's a big complicated explanation and I don't know. I don't understand." Hope the local voters turn out for the next election and vote in someone competent.

----------------------------------------

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There's really no need for an RM administrator to understand structural and civil engineering; their job is to hire applicable experts to deal with the problem. I don't expect the president to know anything about climate change, but he should be able to at least hire actual and credible experts who do know about the subject.

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So, they decided not to put in the same amount of their own money plus use grant money to build a much better bridge because it wasn't needed???

If I lived there I wouldn't be driving over whatever ends up in that location.

Quote (Hutz)

If I lived there I wouldn't be driving over whatever ends up in that location.

Agreed!

If I was the local farmer I'd make the appropriate dirt ramps and post a carefully calculated ramp speed and call it a day.

Keith Cress
kcress - http://www.flaminsystems.com

The way I read it the RM administrator is the one who made the decision that they did not need to build the bridge to Provincial standards. If she is making the decision without benefit of any kind of geotech inspection then I think she does need to understand the problem. She is/was/remains clueless.

----------------------------------------

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Assuming she did make the decision, there were probably a number of people she ignored advising her to do otherwise.

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