On Sunday, October 30, 2022, over 100 people lost their lives after the cable bridge across Machhu river snapped and those who were on the bridge fell in water. Laughter turned to screams of horror as many drowned instantly. The rescue operations are still on. The video captured moments before the tragedy struck has been viral on social media.
WATCH – Moment of #Morbi bridge collapse caught on camera.#MorbiBridgeCollapse pic.twitter.com/2Knwi8gG2p
— TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) October 31, 2022
As can be seen, just seconds before the cables snapped, some of the tourists were seen jumping on the suspension bridge. Earlier videos of the same bridge have also shown people jumping on the bridge. This has led to lot of speculation on social media.
OpIndia reached out to experts in engineering to understand what could have gone wrong. The experts are of the opinion that it is quite unlikely the bridge collapsed due to over capacity and it is likely that the material used was of low quality which could have led to the tragedy.
Dr Devanshu Pandit, Ahmedabad based construction specialist, said that the suspension bridge is held by two cables held together by tower. It appears that one of these two cables failed which could have led to the disaster. He also said that it is possible the cables might be old and which is why they could have weakened and snapped leading to this tragedy.
Many people on social media speculated that there is a chance the bridge collapsed due to overcapacity. However, the experts say this does not seem very likely as bridges are build to withstand much higher weight. Hence, there is a higher chance that this was because of material or joint failure.
Former PWD chief engineer MM Jeevani also held similar viewpoint. Speaking to OpIndia, he said that such construction is distributed as weight per square metres. Hence, the weight of these people cannot be considered too high. Hence, it seems the bridge collapsed, not due to overcapacity but because the suspenders broke.
He further said that till the investigation report is out it will be not be fair to give judgements. However, initial visuals and reports do raise a few questions. Safety of any structure depends on its design. In this case, the design was old. Further, one must see whether the design that was originally made was followed in its totality. Next, if any private agency was given contract for renovation and strengthening the bridge, did any government agency conduct any form of safety audit? All these aspects should be checked, he said.
As of now, the state government has formed a committee to look into the tragedy. Once the investigation is over one will be able to know more.
