Bang: big bridge blocking boulder broken by blasting

Following a recent earthquake in China, the roads and highways had to be cleared quickly to allow emergency deliveries, as well as general transport. One key bridge was blocked by a massive boulder that had been dislodged by the quake. As the boulder was too large to move using the excavators or bulldozers that the bridge could support, a decision was made to use blasting instead to clear the path. A drilling rig was brought into place and this machine bored a blasthole into the errant boulder, with the hol
April 24, 2013 Read time: 1 min
Following a recent earthquake in China, the roads and highways had to be cleared quickly to allow emergency deliveries, as well as general transport. One key bridge was blocked by a massive boulder that had been dislodged by the quake. As the boulder was too large to move using the excavators or bulldozers that the bridge could support, a decision was made to use blasting instead to clear the path. A drilling rig was brought into place and this machine bored a blasthole into the errant boulder, with the hole then being charged with conventional explosives. The blast then broke the boulder into pieces small enough for lighter machinery to move out of the way, allowing the bridge to be reopened to traffic.

Related Content

  • Controlling influence
    January 3, 2013
    New lane control solutions from major roadmarking companies have been installed on highways across the world over recent months. Guy Woodford reports on some of them. Clearview Traffic Group (CTG) recently clocked up the installation of over 70,000 Astucia active flush and surface mounted road studs in the UK. CTG has been involved in numerous road stud installation projects on motorways and other road types in the UK and many other countries worldwide. Its UK installations include over 4,500 Astucia road s
    Read More
  • Hitachi working in Assisi
    July 17, 2012
    In Italy, Casaioli SNC, which specialises in earthmoving, road construction and groundworks, has found that its Hitachi ZAXIS 60USB-3 compact excavator is small enough to work in the narrow streets of Assisi and also powerful enough to do the job. The company is replacing gas and water pipes in the historic city and helping to reconstruct the road network, which was damaged in the 1997 earthquake. Owner Giorgio Casaioli says: "The machine is also quiet, which is very important when working in a city such as
    Read More
  • Building the diamond road in Lesotho
    April 6, 2016
    A job site in the Southern African nation of Lesotho represents one of the most extreme and challenging projects to some key Italian firms of the last 10 years. The project was certainly different from the norm It involves building a road in the Lesotho Mountains, some 200km from the capital Maseru, with the work being carried out by the Cooperative of Building and Cement workers from Ravenna (CMC). CMC, which has ranked among Marini's clients for many years now, is involved in the construction of a
    Read More
  • Yotta’s Horizons and Mayrise create a route map of the world
    September 14, 2016
    Simon Topp, director of international business at software developer Yotta, explained the need for having the best possible plan in place. Highways agencies and departments the world over face a raft of complex and difficult challenges when it comes to managing and maintaining their infrastructure assets. In some countries, where natural disasters or extreme weather events are endemic, good asset management will need to be supplemented by risk and resilience planning. In the US, for example, the Feder
    Read More

Highlighted Content