The Rambler Channel Bridge is a quadruple-track railway

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

. It carries the MTR's

Airport Express The AirPort Express is a Wi-Fi base station product from Apple Inc., part of the AirPort product line. While more compact and in some ways simpler than another Apple Wi-Fi base station, the AirPort Extreme, the Express offers audio output cap ...

and

Tung Chung line The Tung Chung line is one of the ten lines of the MTR system in Hong Kong, linking the town of Tung Chung with central Hong Kong. A part of the Tung Chung line was built along with the Kap Shui Mun Bridge and the Tsing Ma Bridge. The line c ...

over the

Rambler Channel Rambler Channel is a body of water in Hong Kong that separates Tsing Yi Island from Tsuen Wan and Kwai Chung in the New Territories. The channel separates the two landmasses by 900 metres at its widest point. Historically, the channel was known ...

, linking

Tsing Yi station Tsing Yi is an interchange station of the MTR between the Tung Chung line and Airport Express on Tsing Yi Island in Hong Kong. The station is located between Sunny Bay station and Lai King station on the Tung Chung Line, and between Airp ...

and

Lai King station Lai King is an MTR rapid transit station in the suburb of Lai King in the Kwai Tsing District. The station is located above ground on a viaduct and is an interchange for the Tsuen Wan and Tung Chung lines. The Chinese name of the station u ...

History

In 1994, the

Mass Transit Railway Corporation MTR Corporation Limited is a majority government-owned public transport operator and property developer in Hong Kong which operates the Mass Transit Railway, the most popular public transport network in Hong Kong. It is listed on the Hong ...

awarded the contract to design and construct the bridge to Dragages et Travaux Publics, in partnership with Penta-Ocean Construction. The contract was worth $490 million. The bridge was designed by Bouygues Travaux Publics. Construction began in October 1995. It was structurally completed in February 1997. The bridge began carrying revenue passengers with the opening of the Tung Chung line on 21 June 1998.

1996 construction accident

Six construction workers were killed when a metal work platform collapsed on 6 June 1996. The platform, which held four men, plunged 20 metres and crushed two workers below. The men were rushed to

Yan Chai Hospital Yan Chai Hospital () is a Charitable hospital has under the Kowloon West Cluster of the Hospital Authority, providing acute and extended care services to the Tsuen Wan community and its neighbouring areas. The hospital was founded by the Yan Ch ...

in nearby Tsuen Wan and declared dead shortly after arrival at 6:00 pm. Those killed were engineer Tam Wai-shing, 40; Yeung Sung-po, 50; Shek Shing, 58; Wong Kam-wo, 30; and brothers-in-law Law Tai-yau, 36, and Cheng Chi-ming, 33. The Labour Department launched an investigation to determine the cause of the accident. It was aided by specialists from the

Electrical and Mechanical Services Department The Electrical and Mechanical Services Department (EMSD; ) is a Hong Kong government department responsible for inspection and enforcement of operation and safety of many electricity and gas installations; railways and trams; lifts and escalat ...

and the Buildings Department. Construction of the bridge was temporarily halted and the Labour Department inspected all similar work platforms across the territory. The tragedy was blamed on the wrong type of bolt being used to affix the work platform to a concrete pillar. A Coroner's Court inquest before coroner David Thomas heard that the anchor bolts were only half the length required, were designed to hold electric cables, and were screwed into plastic sockets. The platform collapsed after two of the bolts detached. The weight on the platform exceeded four tonnes, or three times more than the bolts could support. On 4 December 1996, the Labour Department issued summonses to Dragages et Travaux Publics; its manager, Didier Noel; and subcontractor Takamura Limited (which built the platform), under charges of breaching general duties provisions under the Factory and Industrial Undertakings Ordinance. Dragages was accused of not providing sufficient training to workers, and failing to ensure the safety of the platform. A representative for Takamura argued against prosecuting the company as it was only responsible for installing the platform. Dragages et Travaux Publics was found solely responsible for the collapse. The company was fined HK$105,000 on 8 August 1997 after admitting to three charges of failing to ensure safety and failing to maintain properly built scaffolding. In October 1997 Takamura Limited (also known as Pacific Island Consultants) was cleared of responsibility for the accident. The tragedy was the single greatest loss of life during the Airport Core Programme.

Description

The bridge is 1,100 metres long. It is made up of precast concrete segments lowered into place by a

launching gantry A launching gantry (also called beam launcher, girder launcher, bridge building crane, and bridge-building machine, locally nicknamed the "Iron Monster") is a special-purpose mobile gantry crane used in bridge construction, specifically segmental ...

. The bilevel main deck segments are eight metres high and weigh 120 tonnes each. The segments are held together with epoxy glue and high-strength steel tendons.

References

External links

* {{Coord, 22, 21, 24.9, N, 114, 6, 44.5, E, display=title, type:landmark Tsing Yi Railway bridges in Hong Kong MTR 1996 industrial disasters