France: Too heavy truck could have caused the deadly collapse of a bridge

Rescuers in action after the collapse of a bridge in Mirepoix-sur-Tarn, near Toulouse, November 18, 2019.

The spectacular collapse of a bridge on Monday in southwestern France, in which two people were killed, may have been caused by the passage of a truck which, according to the mayor of the village of the drama, weighed double the maximum weight allowed.

"We estimate (the weight of the truck) to more than 40 tons, largely.It was a truck of outsize size, the bridge has cracked," said Tuesday to AFP Eric Oget, Mayor of Mirepoix-sur-Tarn , a small town of a thousand inhabitants.

The structure, a metal structure dating from 1931 overlooking the river Tarn, could withstand a maximum load of 19 tons, and a sign at its entrances forbade access to vehicles exceeding this tonnage.

"One of the hypotheses is that the truck that is committed has a weight greater than the limited weight," said Tuesday the Secretary of State for the ecological transition Emmanuelle Wargon. But "it is the prosecutor who will establish the facts," she added on the channel LCI.

The collapse, which occurred Monday shortly after 8:00 am, was spectacular: the deck of the bridge almost completely collapsed and its pavement was almost cut in half, plunging into the river, more than 20 meters deep and 100 meters wide. in this location.

Two people were killed in the accident: a 15-year-old girl and the truck driver.

This truck, a "crane transport carrier", belonged to a local drilling company, which was raided

"If it was the driver of a company for that matter, I would have understood, but the driver of the truck was from here, it surprised me that he engaged with a tonnage of 40 tons or more", added the mayor of Mirepoix-sur-Tarn.

Reliability of the bridges in question

The investigators continued their investigations Tuesday, exploiting in particular the images taken by the divers Monday, valuable technical findings for the continuation of the investigation. The carcass of the truck should be brought to the surface, but this complex operation could take a long time.

On both sides of the bridge, gendarmes were Tuesday "freezing" the scene with lasers and drones for a 3D modeling, noted an AFP journalist.

The rescuers on the suspension bridge, in Mirepoix-sur-Tarn, near Toulouse, November 18, 2019.

"We want to know what happened, we want to understand," insisted Tuesday morning Thomas Ferrandis, a resident of the village.

The steel structure bridge had been checked several times and "had not been identified as posing particular problems," ensured Monday Mrs. Wargon, came on site.

The structure, which measured 155 meters long and 6,50 meters wide, presented "no structural problem" during its last detailed inspection in 2017, according to local authorities, and the last inspection took place in December 2018 .

The book, renovated in 2003, "was not classified surveillance or critical condition," according to Georges Tempez, head of the public body that had carried out the inspection.

The Office of Land Casualty Investigation was also charged with an investigation.

But for the president of the community of communes, Jean-Marc Dumoulin, the passage of overweight trucks was not exceptional, which could have weakened it.

The accident revived the question of the reliability of bridges in France. According to a senatorial mission set up after the murderous collapse of the Italian viaduct of Genoa in August 2018 (43 dead), "at least 25,000 French bridges" are in a bad structural state, out of the country's 200,000 to 250,000 books. - the exact number of road bridges in France is not known.