MANILA, Philippines – President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said on Thursday, March 6, that the “flaw” in the design of the Cabagan-Santa Maria bridge in Isabela as well as the passage of overloaded trucks caused a portion of the structure to collapse.
Marcos gave the assessment in a media interview after he inspected the bridge with Public Works Secretary Manuel Bonoan.
“Ang ending nito, ang puno’t dulo nito, design flaw. It is a design flaw; mali ‘yung design (In the end, the root cause of this is design flaw. It is a design flaw; the design was wrong.)…. The design is really weak,” he told reporters.
Marcos said that the original project cost was P1.8 billion, but it was later pared down to under P1 billion “to save money.”
The bridge began construction in late 2014, under the Rodrigo Duterte administration, and was supposed to be completed in 2019 but had to undergo retrofitting, pushing back its completion to February 1.
Marcos noted that the structure was supposed to be a suspension bridge but it is not supported by cables.
“Ito lang ang suspension bridge na nakita ko sa buong mundo na hindi [gumagamit ng] kable. At ‘yan na mismo ang bumigay. Ayan, o, diyan ang bumigay ‘yung bakal. Kung kable ‘yan, hindi dapat bumigay yan,” he said.
(This is the only suspension bridge that I’ve seen that doesn’t use cables. And that was where the steel [support] yielded. If cables were used, it would have held up.)
He said that the bridge was built at a budget of P900 million, but more was spent on retrofitting the bridge when structural problems were noticed, raising the total cost to P1.2 billion.
Marcos said a more “detailed design” is in the works, and the entire bridge would need to be retrofitted once more.
“So ‘yung nagtitipid tayo, tinipid natin sa P1.8 [billion, useless. Ngayon babalik na naman tayo, gagastos na naman tayo ng malaki. Papalitan natin yang mga support, papalitan; parang nagtayo na naman tayo ng bagong tulay,” he said.
(So what we saved from the P1.8 billion is useless. Now we have to go back and again spend a huge sum. We will replace the support; it will be like building a new bridge.)
Marcos said the contractor for the project is not at fault as they just followed the plan, design, and specifications that were provided to them.
The President also noted that the bridge has a 44-ton capacity but the trucks that used it carried loads that were far beyond this maximum capacity.
Asked who should be held liable for the damage, the President pointed to the ones responsible for the bridge’s design. He added that the overloaded trucks should not have been allowed to cross the bridge.
Bonoan earlier said that a truck that weighed about 102 tons may have overstressed the bridge and caused its collapse.
A 60-meter part of the bridge’s Cabagan side collapsed at around 8 pm on February 27 after a dump truck with boulders was crossing it, according to the Department of Public Works and Highways’ Cagayan Valley Office. The bridge’s hanger rods, which should have acted as a support for the bridge, also collapsed due to the weight. – Rappler.com