[2019-08-27] Chinese technicians in Mozambique repair the Save river bridge

Source: Macauhub

China Road and Bridge Construction (CRBC) group technicians will arrive in Mozambique in the next few days to boost construction work on the diversions that will make it possible for work to move ahead to repair the Save river bridge, according to official information.

Minister of Public Works, Housing and Water Resources, João Machatine, quoted by Radio Moçambique, said that the contractor’s attention is focused on improving the diversions that will offer alternative access to a metal bridge and will serve as a traffic alternative while the main bridge is repaired.

Machatine said he had also noted during a visit to the shipyard that “two-way ramps may cause some constraints to heavy vehicle traffic,” so Chinese technicians arriving within the next few days will resolve these issues so that the traffic can begin to be diverted from next November.

The Save River Bridge, located in the district of Govuro, Inhambane Province, was designed in the 1960s by the late Portuguese engineer Edgar Cardoso and inaugurated on 16 September 1972. It currently has an average daily traffic of 240 to 300 vehicles, mostly heavy.

It is a pre-reinforced suspension bridge, with three 210-metre spans and two 110-metre spans, making a total of 810 metres, a 7.20-metre driving lane and sidewalks of 1.35 metres.

Bridge repairs, expected to last three years and cost over 5.5 billion meticais (US$89.3 million), include reinforcement of cables, suspension cable replacement, reinforced concrete repair, replacement of expansion joints and painting.

The China Road and Bridge Construction group (CRBC) was also the contractor for some of Mozambique’s most iconic post-independence works, such as the Maputo ring road and the Maputo-Catembe Bridge.