Two more bridges shut down yesterday

Heavy rains swelled the Rio Nandayure near Route 902 in Guanacaste, damaging the base of the bridge. Photo by Julio Pena, La Nacion

Yesterday, reports La Nacion, two other bridges were shut down due to structural damages, stranding townspeople who rely on the bridges to get them to the main highways.

One of the bridges is over the Burro River, on the road between San Ramon and Tres Esquinas de La Fortuna. The other bridge is over the Nandayure River in Guanacaste province, resulting in the inhabitants of Zapotal and Bejuco being cut off from the larger nearby town of Carmona. Apparently there is a rough alternative route between the towns that requires a 4 x 4 vehicle. No one was hurt when these bridge collapsed.

Bridge collapses on Osa Peninsula—and it’s not the first

Many of Costa Rica's bridges make you wonder if it'd be better to swim. Photo from emmacarson.com

Just when I thought it was safe to get back on the road, a bridge over the Río Rincón in Puerto Jiménez, on the Osa Peninsula, collapsed on Friday (11/6) when a 95-ton crane attempted to cross it.

The Osa Peninsula, home to Corcovado National Park and deemed by National Geographic Magazine “the most biologically intense place on earth,” is a popular tourist destination for intrepid travelers.

According to La Nación (the country’s Spanish-language daily), the 50-year-old bridge was only meant to support only 35 tons.

Luckily, no one was hurt. But Dios mio! How’m I gonna get to Puerto Jimenez?

Or around the rest of the country, for that matter.

School bus plummets into river

About two weeks ago, on October 22, a bridge in Turrubares (a canton in the province of San José) collapsed and a school bus carrying 38 passengers plunged into the Tárcoles River. Five people were killed. The Turrubares collapse lead to serious questions about the Public Works and Transport Ministry’s competence to maintain bridges and forced the resignation of ministry head Karla González.

The National Emergency Commission (CNE) has declared a “red alert” over the state of bridges in Costa Rica, but engineers have an uphill battle figuring out which bridges to repair first.

Necessary tools for  bridge repair: Google and YouTube

An article in the November 6 issue of the Tico Times reports that “engineers tasked with identifying dangerous bridges in order to prevent another fatal collapse are resorting to Internet images of Costa Rican bridges uploaded by tourists, such is the inadequacy of the government’s own infrastructure file.

Engineer Guillermo Santana of the University of Costa Rica’s National Laboratory of Materials and Structural Models (LANAMME), says there is no complete record of the country’s bridges and the maintenance they have (or haven’t) received. So the engineers have been “getting help from tourists who have uploaded holiday pictures of Costa Rican bridges onto Google and YouTube.”

LANAMME’s research on 418 of the country’s 1,450 bridges shows that half of the structures are more than 50 years old, while the remaining 40 percent have been in use for more than 30 years. Ninety percent of the bridges were thus considered close to or past their recommended life span.

The 10  bridges deemed “high risk” and which will be repaired first are located above the Río Aranjuez, Río Abangares, Río Azufrado, Río Puerto Nuevo, Río Nuevo, Río Chirripó on Route 32 and Route 4, Río  Sarapiquí, Río Sucio and Río Torre.

This Tico Times map was drawn before the Puerto Jimenez bridge collapsed on Nov 6.