Yesterday’s collapse of the Nanfangao Bridge (南方澳橋) in Yilan County might have been due to rusted anchoring points, Taipei Technology College of Engineering dean Sung Yu-chi (宋裕祺) said.
Video footage showed that the vertical cable at the center of the bridge’s steel arch was the first to snap, Sung said.
However, the bridge is suspended by 10 or more steel cables and theoretically, the other cables should have been capable of evenly distributing the weight the broken cable had borne, he said.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
However, it looks like the snapping of the vertical cable caused a domino effect, Sung said.
The bridge was continuously exposed to salty air, which would have rusted the cables, reducing the amount of weight the span could support, Sung said.
Long-term exposure to wind could have also loosened the anchor points, making them unable to sustain the bridge’s weight, he said.
The collapse of the arch was caused by the dissolution of the force equilibrium between the bridge and the arch, although an investigation is needed to confirm the cause, he said.
Bridges are designed with safety factors and mechanisms taken into account, and routine inspections and precise equipment calibrations are required to maintain normal operations, he said.
Wang Chung-yu (王仲宇), a professor of civil engineering at National Central University, also said the cables could have rusted.
Strong winds brought by Typhoon Mitag would have caused the cables to sway constantly, which could have forced the cables to the point of snapping, Wang said.
An site inspection to determine which anchor point broke first is required, he said.
Authorities should make precise records of the site to compare with the records of the bridge’s last inspection, which could help clarify what happened, Wang said.
The bridge was an older design, created when the idea of protection from natural erosion was not yet popular, and it was possible that maintenance checks could have overlooked such possibilities, he added.
However, he believes that Mitag should be blamed for the collapse.
Taiwan International Ports Corp (TIPC) said it has conducted routine annual maintenance since the bridge was completed 21 years ago and, per regulations, each cable cord was inspected every four years.
The last inspection was conducted in 2016, when the Yilan County Government awarded the commission to Chien Hsin University of Technology and Science, TIPC said.
The university’s report suggested reinforcing the bridge body with concrete, removing rust from the cable beams, repairing the downspouts and replacing the expansion joints of the angle iron, it said.
It budgeted NT$10 million (US$322,113 at the current exchange rate) between 2017 and last year to cover the repairs and reinforcements noted in the report, the company said.
TIPC chief executive Chen Shao-liang (陳邵良) declined to comment on whether the cables snapped first, saying only that the company would await the results of the investigations.
Additional reporting by Hsiao Yu-hsin
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) was sentenced to six months in prison, commutable to a fine, by the New Taipei District Court today for contravening the Personal Data Protection Act (個人資料保護法) in a case linked to an alleged draft-dodging scheme. Wang allegedly paid NT$3.6 million (US$114,380) to an illegal group to help him evade mandatory military service through falsified medical documents, prosecutors said. He transferred the funds to Chen Chih-ming (陳志明), the alleged mastermind of a draft-evasion ring, although he lost contact with him as he was already in detention on fraud charges, they said. Chen is accused of helping a
UNREASONABLE SURVEILLANCE: A camera targeted on an road by a neighbor captured a man’s habitual unsignaled turn into home, netting him dozens of tickets The Taichung High Administrative Court has canceled all 45 tickets given to a man for failing to use a turn signal while driving, as it considered long-term surveillance of his privacy more problematic than the traffic violations. The man, surnamed Tseng (曾), lives in Changhua County and was reported 45 times within a month for failing to signal while driving when he turned into the alley where his residence is. The reports were filed by his neighbor, who set up security cameras that constantly monitored not only the alley but also the door and yard of Tseng’s house. The surveillance occurred from July
SECURITY: Starlink owner Elon Musk has taken pro-Beijing positions, and allowing pro-China companies to control Taiwan’s critical infrastructure is risky, a legislator said Starlink was reluctant to offer services in Taiwan because of the nation’s extremely high penetration rates in 4G and 5G services, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said yesterday. The ministry made the comments at a meeting of the legislature’s Transportation Committee, which reviewed amendments to Article 36 of the Telecommunications Management Act (電信管理法). Article 36 bans foreigners from holding more than 49 percent of shares in public telecommunications networks, while shares foreigners directly and indirectly hold are also capped at 60 percent of the total, unless specified otherwise by law. The amendments, sponsored by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ko
A Japan Self-Defense Forces vessel entered the Taiwan Strait yesterday, Japanese media reported. After passing through the Taiwan Strait, the Ikazuchi was to proceed to the South China Sea to take part in a joint military exercise with the US and the Philippines, the reports said. Japan Self-Defense Force vessels were first reported to have passed through the strait in September, 2024, with two further transits taking place in February and June last year, the Asahi Shimbun reported. Yesterday’s transit also marked the first time since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi took office that a Japanese warship has been sent through the Taiwan
RSS