Four men died and six were badly injured on Tuesday morning when a bridge launching girder crane collapsed while working on the construction of the Cheongnyongcheon Bridge, part of the new Seoul-Sejong Expressway in Anseong, 75km south of Seoul in South Korea.
The incident occurred as the launcher crane was installing a series of 50 metre concrete bridge decks when the support for the launcher crane's main girder appeared to fail, causing the five bridge sections, and the men to fall 52 metres to the ground below. According to a local engineer the load may have been unbalanced load causing the load to shift to one side, thus overloading one of support piers.
Only 10 people were working on site at the time, eight of whom were directly involved with the bridge launch operation, the other two were carrying out an inspection work on the Sejong bound section.
The bridge sections are part of a 210 metre span, with support piers reaching heights of up to 52 metres. The Hyundai Engineering, which is the main contractor responsible for the lifting operations issued the following statement: "We sincerely apologise for the tragic loss of lives and injuries caused by the accident at our construction site. We are actively cooperating with the relevant authorities to ensure a swift site recovery and a thorough investigation into the exact cause of the accident."
This photo captures the collapse as it started
The dashcam video below shows the incident from the road
The following video is a local news report which reveals a little more about the collapse
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