Watch the burning bridge collapse!

[Capt Worley PE]

Just like a set of dominoes going down.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-22641179

 

[Dexman PE PMP]

Looks like the wooden sub-structure. There are hundreds of old wooden railroad bridges throughout the southwest US, and most of them are over 50yrs old. Because it's so dry out here, they will last for decades with minimal maintenance.

 

[blybrook PE]

Looks like it was burning pretty hot before it came down. Nice collapse footage too!

 

[Road Guy]

We've got 4 just like that from a rails to trails project 15 years ago that seemed like a good idea.. Now we're about to spend millions to rehab them....

 

[Lumber Jim]

When designing a bridge, is the failure mode "one support structure collapsings and causing the one next to it to collapse" ever analyzed? What is the "ideal" failure mode? Speaking from experience from the mechanical side, I know that this can be difficult to predict...

 

[mizzoueng]

Neat. The rails looked like ropes just hanging there as it went down. Funny how almost all the trusses collapsed the same way the whole way down.