Skip to main content

Gilpin Demolition gets tough with A38 overpass in Devon, UK

December 19, 2014
There was no need for a day shift when Devon-based Gilpin Demolition took on a timely challenge - demolish an overpass bridge in 15 hours and reopen the A38 by the following morning.

The 40m long and 8m high single carriageway bridge, made of 1,400 tonnes of steel and concrete, was an overpass near Rattery. By 8PM the A38 below had been closed and the bridge carriageways were barricaded, ready for Gilpin’s first crew to arrive and lay down 400tonnes of stone road protection on the A38.

Hydraulic breakers then moved in for the real work to begin, as the video shows – there was no sleeping on this job.

As the sun rose over the A38 next morning, the last of the crew moved off site, after 960 man-hours of work that included six dumpers completing 80 trips. The job was 100% finished and the material was 100% recycled.

Related Content

  • Road recycling in Denmark
    May 13, 2024
    A novel approach to road refurbishment has saved time, money and carbon emissions in Denmark, while delivering a quality road surface.
  • Towers of power: California’s Gerald Desmond Bridge Replacement
    May 8, 2019
    Challenging ground conditions meant a design rethink - and some engineering firsts - for California’s Gerald Desmond Bridge Replacement Project* The Port of Long Beach on Terminal Island south of Los Angeles is the second-busiest container port in the US. It handles around 15% of all imported goods, much of it with Asia. As the Port of Long Beach was growing in importance over the past half century, the 51-year-old Gerald Desmond Bridge has faithfully been delivering thousands of daily commuters to wo
  • Tunnelling challenge on German project
    June 13, 2012
    A massive construction project has been underway deep in the heart of the Schnecktal valley area in Germany. From the surface, though, you would never be able to tell. The majority of the work is underground, as a joint-venture team led by German contractor Wayss and Freytag Ingenieurbau builds the nearly 7km long Finne Tunnel. After a few years of tunnel boring operations, the contractor is at work finishing the interior of the tunnel, slipforming first the tunnel’s floor and then a walkway with its GOMACO
  • Tunnels and bridges, improving Argentina's major road link
    May 2, 2012
    A road improvement plus tunnel and bridge building contract in an area once inhabited by dinosaurs in northern Argentina, is a small but key part of an ambitious project to complete a road that will eventually link the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of Latin America - Adriana Potts reports. Remote, rough and spectacular are words that come to mind when describing the mountains of Ischigualasto in Argentina's northern province of San Juan This is the only place in the world where an undisturbed sequence of rock