Bridge collapses in US

[clutteredup]

Isn't this terrible news How amazing they saved the school bus.

Maybe some reason to suspect the repairs though

The casualty figures are incredibly lucky - maybe because the bridge wasn't very high and some sections just dropped flat - I hope they stay that low.

My thoughts entirely Wendy.

the photos are really scary, it's tragic

oh wow . The death toll is bound to increase though isn't it?

I don't think it going to increase to much. I read through all the news on it, and it looks really really good when you consider the bridge was packed.

However, I think whoever was doing those repairs has some explaining to do!!!

From the NY Times:

I actually read CNN because I can get news from all over the country. They actually didn't talk about any workers. I will read the other article though.

www.cnn.com/2007/US/08/01/bridge.collapse/index.html

It does sound like there is the real possibility that they will find more people down there.

The CNN piece says:

So there were either 8 or 18 workers on the bridge, but "nothing structural was being done".

Heads will roll.

What a nightmare scenario. The low death toll is miraculous under the circumstances.

From a British perspective, it's interesting to see in various news items over here that the age of the bridge was considered to be a factor. Forty years is not old for a bridge. I regularly travel across one that's 160 years old.

The problem must be structural. The only good outcome from this is that all bridges of that construction will now be checked. God forbid that it should happen again.

It can't just be a coincidence that there was work going on - supposedly it was just resurfacing but one report mentioned work on the "joints", and one eyewitness said the bridge went up before it went down.

Minneapolis Star Tribune report

I imagine that it was not the age of the bridge but the repairs being done on the bridge.