A recently completed section of the Hongqi Bridge in China’s southwestern Sichuan province dramatically collapsed into a river on Tuesday afternoon following a massive landslide. Dramatic videos of the event have gone viral on social media, showing the mountainside giving way and sending large chunks of the concrete structure crashing down.
A critical link along a national highway that connects central China to Tibet, the 758-meter-long bridge was partially destroyed. Fortunately, local authorities confirmed that no casualties were reported due to timely action.
Bridge Closed Just Hours Before Collapse
The bridge was fortunately closed to traffic before the structure collapsed, averting potential disaster. Authorities had detected warning signs the day before the failure.
Early Warning: Police in the city of Maerkang shut the Hongqi Bridge to all traffic on Monday afternoon after engineers detected cracks on nearby slopes and roads, in addition to significant shifts of terrain on the adjacent mountain.
Deteriorating Conditions: Geological conditions deteriorated dramatically Tuesday, officials said, setting off a large landslide. The slide undermined the roadbed and the supporting structures for the approach bridge and caused its catastrophic failure.
Geological Instability Cited: Preliminary findings point to geological instability in the steep mountainous region, known for a history of landslides, as the immediate cause of the collapse.
Questions Raised Over New Infrastructure
The failure of Hongqi Bridge, built by state-backed Sichuan Road & Bridge Group and completed only earlier this year, has reignited concerns about the durability of new infrastructure in China’s rugged western provinces
Investigation Launched: The local government initiated a detailed technical investigation to establish whether geological instability was the only factor that caused the disaster or if structural or engineering weaknesses were also responsible. Broader Context: The incident comes only a few months after another high-profile infrastructure failure in China; in August, a railway bridge under construction in the province of Qinghai collapsed, killing at least 12 workers. The collapse of this critical transportation link will require a long detour, disrupting travel and economic activity between Sichuan and the Tibetan Plateau.
