Safety of structures is paramount to the UK Bridges Board and recent guidance supported by the Board should ensure that bridge engineers are doing all they can to manage safety critical fixings.

One way of improving safety is by looking to plug gaps in knowledge. The UK Bridges Board had identified the need for guidance on hidden structural components that are not easily inspectable. This month sees publication of new guidance: ‘Management of Safety Critical Fixings’ that the Board helped to initiate.

When bridges fail the effects can be catastrophic. Last year’s FIU bridge collapse in Miami left six people dead; and when the Morandi bridge collapsed in Genoa 43 died. Fortunately, such incidents are extremely rare.

In the UK, inquiries into bridge failures that followed heavy flooding in Cumbria in 2009 helped to raise awareness of issues considered vital for the UK Bridges Board. As a result, the Board supported an update to a CIRIA manual on scour at bridges and other hydraulic structures to help bridge owners to address the risk of scour to infrastructure built in or near rivers and other channels.

The events in Cumbria also provided a catalyst for establishing the Bridge Inspector Certification Scheme to improve the consistency and competency of bridge inspections. To date there are now 33 bridge inspectors who have gone through the scheme.

And members of the Board have taken decisions, following inspections, to close major bridges when they have had identified safety concerns. Notably, in 2010 Transport for London closed the Hammersmith Flyover and in 2015 Transport Scotland closed the Forth Road Bridge.

The UK Bridges Board actively engages with specialist group Structural-Safety, which works with industry on safety concerning the design, construction and use of structures. The group has a committee known as SCOSS, which maintains a review of building and civil engineering matters that affect the safety of structures; and a confidential safety reporting scheme known as CROSS that allows lessons to be shared.

Both SCOSS and CROSS play a vital role in the sector and it is worth reading their reports and signing up to their alerts.

But there may still be some gaps in knowledge, according to UK Bridges Board chair Liz Kirkham.

“We have rail, air and marine accident investigation boards and we will soon have an accident investigation branch for roads. I think their remit should be expanded to include design failures of infrastructure, as there is currently no statutory body to investigate bridge failures.”

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