100-foot span of new Mesa bridge collapses

Arizona Department of Transportation officials said a 114-foot span of bridge along Loop 202’s Red Mountain Freeway east of Power Road was at its most vulnerable point in the construction process when it collapsed Thursday morning.

Video: Loop 202 collapse

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Graphic: See how the bridge is supposed to function

The collapse started at 8:30 a.m. in east Mesa when concrete girders began toppling from their pier supports along the westbound lanes. Arizona Department of Transportation spokesman Doug Nintzel said nine of 11 girders fell, leaving debris in the Central Arizona Project canal and portions of the overpass hanging.

Nintzel said no workers were in the area at the time of the collapse, and no one was injured.

Sue Karich, who lives west of Power Road, said she was cleaning her backyard swimming pool at the time of the collapse.

“I heard something that sounded like a truck crashing,” she said. “Then I heard another one, and then another one.”

She said she climbed a pool ladder in time to see the last four or five girders drop to the ground.

“It was almost like a sonic boom,” she said.

Karich said the contractor, Pulice Construction, already had problems with the bridge construction in February or March, and she will not feel safe driving on the bridge when it opens.

“They obviously don’t know what they’re doing,” Karich said.

ADOT spokesman Bill Pederson confirmed that Pulice Construction had to pull down a concrete pier this spring. But he emphasized that Pulice discovered the problem on its own and corrected the situation.

“They discovered that they had not put enough reinforcing steel in the pier,” he said.

Nintzel said the beams that fell Thursday had been balanced on the piers about three weeks ago, and were at their most vulnerable point because they were not yet linked together.

He said bridges under construction should not be compared to operating bridges because inspections and safety measures have not yet been completed.

“This will be a safe bridge when we’re finished with it,” he said.

He said the collapse will not affect Gov. Janet Napolitano’s order last week for ADOT workers to inspect all Arizona bridges. That order came after a bridge collapse last week in Minnesota, where at least five people were killed.

Vehicles from the Arizona Central Project, Maricopa County Flood Control District, Mesa police and ADOT moved in and out of the east Mesa accident site all morning. A Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office helicopter also patroled above the site.

Nintzel said Pulice Construction will lead the investigation into the collapse with assistance from ADOT.

“We’re in the very early stages of looking into this,” he said. “We don’t know yet why this happened.”

He said the collapse won’t affect the project’s scheduled completion in summer 2008 for the final stretch of Loop 202.