Kaoping Bridge (高屏大橋), the main road link between Kaohsiung and Pingtung Counties, was reopened to small vehicles yesterday morning after irregular movement of the bridge was detected on Thursday, possibly caused by heavy vehicles driving too fast.
The speed limit for vehicles traveling on the bridge has been reduced from 70kph to 60kph and heavy vehicles such as buses and trucks will be forbidden to cross the bridge until the completion of repairs, according to the Directorate General of Highways (DGH) under the Ministry of Transportation and Communications.
"We have not yet decided when to resume full traffic. But for safety's sake, we will enforce stricter speed limits on the bridge and temporarily ban large vehicles from crossing the bridge for fear that large vehicles could be heavily loaded," Wu Wen-hsiung (
Kaoping Bridge, under the administration of the DGH, crosses Kaoping Creek and is the major link between Kaohsiung County and Pingtung County.
The bridge was closed after the emergency alarm on the bridge went off on Thursday afternoon at 3:20pm when the bridge's safety monitoring system detected "unusual conditions."
"The alarm will go off when it detects shifting on the bridge surface, such as slants or sinking of the piers. The alarm went off [on Thursday] because it detected a shift on the bridge surface," Wu told the Taipei Times.
According to DGH, the shift on the surface might be the result of heavy vehicles driving at high speeds.
After immediate examination from the DGH, with the assistance of some 60 navy divers who went underwater to conduct structural-integrity checks, Wu said that the foundation of the bridge's No. 21 support has been eroded by water currents and its three piers were found to have cracks.
Wu said that the directorate has already contacted architects and engineering experts and the plan and budget for repairs would be ready by next week.
In August 2000, due to the insufficient strength of the bridge's structure, two sections of the bridge collapsed into the Kaoping Creek, dumping over 20 vehicles into the river and injuring some 22 people. After emergency recovery efforts, the bridge resumed its service in March last year.
In a press conference yesterday, PFP lawmakers Lee Hong-chun (李鴻鈞) and Liu Wen-hsiung (劉文雄) warned that, among the 7,254 cross-river bridges in Taiwan, 68 have been damaged by strong river currents.
They also said illegal gravel excavation was a major threat to the safety of the bridges.
Wu, however, said that illegal gravel excavation was not the issue this time.
"Illegal gravel excavation has not been a problem since the bridge collapsed the first time. The problem [on Thursday] was strong water currents and this had nothing to do with gravel excavation."
The government has banned gravel excavation in Kaoping River since 1997.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
RSS