The Jiazhou Bay Bridge is the longest sea bridge in the world. I found out later, Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge , which is currently under construction and scheduled to be opened in 2016 with an aggregate 50.0 km (31.1miles) of bridges and tunnels is to overtake the Jiaozhou Bay Bridge as the longest sea bridge in the world once construction is complete.
It was amazing, when browsing through an article that I bumped into an archived news about the longest sea bridge in the world. The pics were astonishing as I have never seen such an architectural marvel.
How do those structures support the bridge?What about the sea waves and strong winds running past the ocean. Furthermore, how they constructed it reminds me of the capability of a determined human beings who built the highest tower till God had to confuse people's tongues(people began to speak different languages).Hopefully that does not happen again because what will Our Father confuse us next with? I guess we are safe until some weird scientists tries going to heaven using their tech or inventions.
Facts
1. It was designed by Shadong Gaosu group and opened to the public in 2011.
2. It took 4 years to build with a workforce of 10,000 people.
3. It is 26.7 km long and runs in Eastern China Shandong province.
Design
1. The design of the bridge is T-shaped.
2. The construction used 450,000 tons of steel and 2.3 million cubic metres of concrete.
3. The bridge is designed to be able to withstand severe earthquakes, typhoons, and collisions from ships.
4. It is supported by 5,238 concrete piles.
5. The cross section consists of two beams in total 35 m wide carrying six lanes.
Protection against erosion
To protect the bridge against
erosion, the engineers chose to coat it with a thick protective layer of polyurea (Spray Foam, 2011). This layer of polyurea protects the bridge
against humidity, salinity, and other corrosive agents; it has high tensile strength, impact resistance, abrasion resistance, and UV ray resistant.
In order to protect the bridge’s over 5,200 support piles, they implemented a new anti- erosion system which is a system comprising three layers. The first layer is an anti-rust primer, and then a simple intermediate closed layer, followed by an ultraviolet, radiation, and aging resistant outer layer. The piles additionally have a protective coat of special paint to finish them off.