Japan's Bridges: Hiyori Bridge in Miyagi Prefecture (5)

June 2011 (38.415 Degrees, 141.312 Degrees) Hiyori Bridge

Just one more photo of the Hiyori Bridge and then we'll move on to something new. It's reassuring that bridges performed so well during the March tsunami. If the bridge was designed for ground shaking and the superstructure was above the waves, there was very little damage. Even if the superstructure was overtopped by the waves, the girders usually stayed in place.

There were many stories of people whose lives were saved because they were able to get onto a bridge. Unfortunately, there were also some stories of people who were swept away as they tried to cross a bridge just as the waves overtopped the deck. However, a really tall structure like the Hiyori Bridge would provide a safe haven for anyone lucky enough to get to it before the tsunami arrived.

Japan's Bridges: Hiyori Bridge in Miyagi Prefecture (5) by Mark Yashinsky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.