Skip to main content

VIDEO – demolition of UK’s M1 motorway overpass

April 17, 2015
Specialist contractor Armac recently demolished a bridge over the UK’s busy M1 motorway. The work was carried out within a tight timeframe as this important route could only be closed for a short period at night over a weekend when traffic would be at its lightest so as to minimise disruption.

Equipment was used initially to prepare the site, so as to reduce the risk to the surrounding area. Blast curtains were set in place so as to minimise the spread of debris, before the charges were activated. With the bridge then demolished by the blast, a fleet of excavators with demolition attachments was then brought in to cut up the wreckage and reduce the rubble to a manageable size, allowing it to be transported away.

Video footage has finally emerged of Armac’s spectacular bridge implosion over the M1 motorway which took place a few weeks back.

This silent movie from the 2309 Highways Agency uses time-lapse to capture the preparation and the blast before the work really starts with around with something like 10 excavators cutting up and processing the fallen bridge deck.

The “Bridge Busters” then deploy a veritable fleet of equipment to clear the site in readiness for the reopening of Junction 19.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • UK smart motorway work for M4 link
    September 16, 2019
    Highways England in the UK is carrying out major upgrade work for the busy M4 motorway, running west from capital London. In all 11 bridges are being replaced along a 51km stretch of the M4 between London and Reading. When complete, the current hard shoulder will have been rebuilt and resurfaced to allow traffic to use it as a live lane. The section carrying the heaviest traffic, between the M25 ring road around London and the main exit for Heathrow Airport, will be widened so that it will feature five la
  • The radically changing face of UK highways management
    May 14, 2014
    The British Government policy paper ‘Action for Roads: A network for the 21st century’ sets out radical change to the strategic way roads are funded and managed – including plans to turn the Highways Agency into a Government-owned company and a pledge to invest over €33.4 billion (£28 billion) in roads maintenance between 2015 and 2020. Jenny Moten, Highways Agency divisional director for Network Services, gave a keynote presentation on the new approach to strategic highways management during the Road Safet
  • Almost gone: Canada’s old Port Mann Bridge deconstructed
    August 14, 2015
    Three years ago a welder’s cut halved Canada’s old Port Mann Bridge. David Arminas reports from the banks of the Fraser River. By the time this issue of World Highways reaches you, one of Canada’s iconic steel arch bridges will be a shadow of its former self. It’s been a three-year demolition job since the first cut across the deck of the old Port Mann Bridge just outside the city of Vancouver on Canada’s Pacific coast. A new 10-lane 2.2km Port Mann Bridge opened in 2012 (see box). It runs parallel to the o
  • Benin airport job for Topcon’s RD-M1 scanner
    May 13, 2022
    A $16 million runway project at Cotonou Cadjehoun Airport needed Topcon Positioning’s RD-M1 road scanner to ensure precise milling and quality resurfacing.