What Happened To the Bay Bridge? 407
farnsworth writes "Tony Alfrey has put together a fascinating page with some history, analysis, and possible explanations for what ultimately went wrong with the recent emergency repair of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The bridge has been closed for days and is not scheduled to open for days to come, hugely inconveniencing more than 250,000 people a day. His analysis touches on possibly poor welding, a possibly flawed temporary fix, and the absence of a long-term fix or adequate follow-up by Caltrans, the agency responsible for the bridge. Slashdot is a great engineering community; what other insights do you have on the bridge situation?"
First Failure (Score:0, Funny)
Forgot to fasten those cables, eh?
still dead! (Score:4, Funny)
For several work mornings the headline on "the new" CNN.com has been "Bay Bridge still closed."
In my head I hear it in the voice of Chevy Chase.
"General Francisco Franco is still dead!"
Re:still dead! (Score:5, Funny)
Slashdot is a great engineering community
He must be new here;)
Speaking as the owner, I'm furious (Score:5, Funny)
Four years ago I bought that bridge along with a package of subprime mortgages to highly qualified homeowners.
No worries about the Bay Bridge! (Score:1, Funny)
If you're interested, I can get you a great deal on a used bridge here in NY to replace it. Shipping and handling from Long Island not included.
Temporary fix insufficent (Score:3, Funny)
They should have used duct-tape!
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Wrong audience (Score:5, Funny)
No, Slashdot is mostly made up of computer janitors; the greatest insight you'll get out of most of the posters here is, "hurrr durr, the bridge must've been running Windoze! LOL!", with maybe a little "omg the twin towers were collapsed by EXPLOSIVES!!!!"-style conspiracy theory and "THE GOVERNMENT IS BAD!!!" braindead libertarianism thrown in for color.
Closing the bridge makes it 100% safe (Score:5, Funny)
If their goal was to improve the safety of the bridge, then they totally succeeded.
Re:still dead! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bay bridge fix (Score:1, Funny)
Thank goodness you're here! Judd Ascrak has been welding on this thing all night and I'm starting to think we need someone with... a bit of experience who is able to work as a civil engineer. We've been staring at our torch tips all night wondering if we should place an ad or try craigslist.
I asked them to give you a call. Our IT guy has a bit of experience using a phone, so I'll have him set up the connection.
Re:small (Score:5, Funny)
Re:still dead! (Score:5, Funny)
Aw, everyone knows Slashdot is full of experts. Even if we don't know what we're talking about, we'll still pretend to be experts. Well, until a real expert speaks up and makes us look stupid. :)
Re:My insight (Score:3, Funny)
I agree it is important. It keeps drivers from clogging up my train ride every morning. But it isn't a "landmark" in the sense that tourists don't go to look at it. (Except for the dumb ones suckered by locals saying "it's being repainted...the gray is the primer.")
Imagine a beowulf cluster of bay bridges, (Score:1, Funny)
&.c &c. &c.
Re:What Happened To the Bay Bridge? (Score:2, Funny)
Sir, I can make no claims as to the veracity nor contrewise of your premises.
However, should they prove to be true then surely a far greater mystery is how it has stayed up so far.
Verily thine,
B. Franklin.
Re:Wrong audience (Score:4, Funny)
Re:No worries about the Bay Bridge! (Score:4, Funny)
Bridges aren't that expensive, it's the assembly and installation that kills you.
Re:What Happened To the Bay Bridge? (Score:3, Funny)
I suspect that California educated engineers had a lot to do with the problem. A panel had to decide how to fix the problem. The panel was composed, by law, of one gay, one lesbian, one transvestite, one Mormon, one Moslem, one Black, one Hispanic - the list goes on and on.
You REALLY don't know how things work in California.
We got rid of the Mormon after the Prop 8 debacle.
Re:still dead! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:No worries about the Bay Bridge! (Score:2, Funny)
Bridges aren't that expensive, it's the assembly and installation that kills you.
... so it's like buying Ikea?