A stroke of luck: it's hard to believe from the dramatic images, but apparently nobody was injured in the collapse. When parts of the bridge fell into the Elbe shortly after 3 a.m., nobody was travelling on it. During the day, the Carola Bridge, which connects the new town with the old town, is very busy. Just 18 minutes earlier, a tram had passed over the crossing.
This morning, steamship employees secured the steamer "Meißen", which is moored just behind the collapsed bridge. A strong current had formed at the edges of the collapsed concrete section. The fire brigade secured the situation and limited itself to damage limitation. It assumes that there is an acute risk of the other bridge sections collapsing. "We expect that other parts of the bridge could collapse," said a fire service spokesman in the morning. He called on people to stay as far away from the bridge as possible. "There is a danger to life" on and around the bridge.
Central transport routes blocked - on land and in the water
The Carola Bridge, one of the most important transport links in the Saxon state capital, has been cancelled. Around 40,000 cars cross the bridge every day. In addition, there are thousands of pedestrians and cyclists. On weekdays, lines 3 and 7 cross the bridge every hour, even at night. The bridge also spans the shipping lane on the Elbe, which will remain closed until further notice. The paddle steamer fleet, which takes tourists to Saxon Switzerland and back, and the ship freight traffic to and from the Czech Republic can no longer get through. A gap about one metre long has formed at the bridgehead on the Old Town side. The leaking water from the district heating pipe has completely submerged parts of the terrace bank. As a result, the surrounding streets and parts of the banks of the Elbe are also closed.
First assumptions about the cause of the collapse
The three-part Carola Bridge has been undergoing renovation since 2019. It was only in March that parts of the bridge were reopened to traffic after an extensive overhaul. The refurbishment of the eastern bridge section was completed in June 2021. The construction costs totalled around 4.1 million euros. The part that has now collapsed would have been due next year.
Even in the run-up to the work, the city council repeatedly spoke of signs of fatigue on the structure from the 1970s. However, according to Holger Kalbe, the local head of the bridge and engineering structures department, it was not foreseeable that the condition of the bridge would be so bad that it would collapse. Just a few hours after the collapse, the first suspicions about the cause are now being voiced: Kolbe suspects that there had been a massive ingress of chloride in GDR times. This could have led to the accident. According to Kalbe, chloride removal had already been carried out on the building in the past. However, there was a transport company pylon at the demolition site, so it is possible that a massive chloride ingress had occurred there. However, this is only speculation that needs to be verified. Another speculation is that a broken district heating pipe caused the bridge to vibrate and collapse.
