MIAMI — Federal investigators say design flaws caused cracking in a pedestrian bridge that collapsed near Miami in March. The National Transportation Safety Board did not blame those errors for the March 15 collapse in the two-page investigative update released Thursday. The bridge was meant to link Florida International University with the neighbouring community of Sweetwater. Experts from the Federal Highway Administration determined the design underestimated the structural load on the north end of the bridge while overestimating the strength of a key structural component. The report said cracking documented in the bridge in the weeks before the collapse was “consistent with the identified errors.”The project was supposed to showcase a faster, cheaper and safer method of bridge-building.

Source: National Post November 15, 2018 19:41 UTC