Heron Road Bridge

The Heron Road Bridge

The Heron Road Bridge is a bridge in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It connects Baseline Road and Heron Road passing over both the Rideau River and the Rideau Canal just south of Carleton University. The bridge was built in 1966, and its construction saw one of the worst accidents in Ottawa history.

Collapse

On August 10, 1966, the partially completed south span of the bridge collapsed, killing nine workers and injuring another fifty-five. The $100,000 inquest put the blame on the use of green lumber and the lack of diagonal bracing on the wooden support forms, causing a collapse as concrete was being placed to form the bridge deck. As a result of the findings, the Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario suspended two of its members, reprimanded a third, and the construction company, O.J. Gaffney Limited of Stratford, Ontario, was fined $5,000, the maximum penalty under the existing Construction Safety Act. And after very little delay, the province of Ontario’s construction safety standards were completely rewritten. Just to the west of the bridge, there is a plaque honouring the nine workers killed.[1]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The day the bridge came tumbling down". The Ottawa Citizen. 6 August 2006. Retrieved 12 August 2012.

Coordinates: 45°22′32″N 75°42′00″W / 45.375499°N 75.69998°W / 45.375499; -75.69998


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