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Mar 24, 2008 9:16 pm US/Central
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NTSB To Examine St. Cloud Bridge
ST. CLOUD, Minn. (AP) ―
Federal investigators probing the Minneapolis freeway bridge collapse want to examine the St. Cloud bridge that was closed last week because of distorted gusset plates.
The Minnesota Department of Transportation said Monday that the National Transportation Safety Board asked to review the Highway 23 bridge because of its similarities to the Interstate 35W bridge that fell in August. MnDOT said federal investigators will examine the St. Cloud bridge on Wednesday.
State transportation officials are also moving to hire Wiss, Janney, Elstner and Associates Inc. to determine whether the bridge's gusset plates can be repaired. That's the same firm working for the state on the federal bridge collapse investigation.
State transportation officials closed the Highway 23 bridge last Thursday after finding slight bowing in four gusset plates.
Acting state Transportation Commissioner Bob McFarlin went to St. Cloud on Monday for an update. Mayor Dave Kleis and City Administrator Mike Williams accompanied him on his look at the bridge, which MnDOT had scheduled for replacement in 2015 but was considering moving up to 2010 even before Thursday's closure.
McFarlin said repairing the bridge and reopening it as an interim step would not preclude its replacement. Cost estimates for a replacement run between $25 million and $35 million.
MnDOT is no closer to knowing what caused the four gusset plates to bend one-quarter of an inch, he said.
Old photos recently released by the National Transportation Safety Board of the 35W bridge show that two of its gusset plates were slightly bent as early as 2003, four years before the span collapsed into the Mississippi River, killing 13 people. The NTSB has determined the plates on the 35W bridge were too thin, though it is still working to determine what caused the span to fall.
McFarlin on Monday denied that the photos had any impact on MnDOT's decision to close the St. Cloud bridge.
"We have to be very careful," he said. "It's best to leave the interpretation of what these pictures mean to the NTSB and the experts."
Federal investigators have said some gussets on the 35W bridge may have failed because they were designed too thin for the loads they had to carry. State bridge engineer Dan Dorgan said last week that wasn't the case with the gussets on the St. Cloud bridge.
Kleis briefed the City Council during its Monday night meeting. He encouraged members to tell legislators to push to replace the bridge sooner rather than later so that the replacement would coincide with improvements slated to be made to Highway 23 next year.
"We'd rather have a two-year construction cycle versus a five-year construction cycle in that area," he said.
(© 2008 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)