Possible design flaw found in collapsed U.S. bridge

[cal04]

A week after a deadly bridge collapse, U.S. Navy divers cut through tangled debris with underwater torches and saws on Wednesday in the search for victims while investigators identified a possible flaw in the 40-year-old span's design.

The August 1 rush-hour collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge hurled vehicles into the Mississippi River 65 feet below, with many tumbling onto the bridge's crumpled concrete deck.

Reacting to the disaster, officials demanded inspections of potentially suspect bridges across the United States amid renewed calls to shore up the country's aging infrastructure.

(snip)
National Transportation Safety Board investigators said they had found a potential design problem with gusset plates, or steel plates that tie together angled steel beams of the bridge's frame.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070808/ts_nm/bridge_collapse_dc_1

[kestrel91316]

1. Possible design flaw according to kestrel: long bridge, no supports.

[Sal Minella]

3. That 390-foot unsupported center section looked AWFULLY long to me.....

[EST]

2. Y'know, there might be some miner way it could have been improved

at the beginning-if you waited to get the absolute pinnacle of perfection, you'd never get anything done.

If a bridge works perfectly well for thirty or forty years then suddenly drops dead, it isn't because-clenis like-somebody used a different set of assumptions forty years ago.
It's because we didn't take care of what we had. Penny wise and pound foolish is a worn out saying from a quarter millenia ago that is still around because it is true-again and again.

[applegrove]

4. When they first reported it was a unique design for a bridge - I wondered if that

would end up being a smoking gun.

[Booster]

5. Just follow the money back to see who got paid for giving that

contract out.