Urmitzer railway bridge
Coordinates: 50 ° 25 ′ 18 ″ N , 7 ° 31 ′ 36 ″ E
Urmitzer railway bridge | ||
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Official name | Rhine bridge Engers-Urmitz | |
use | railroad | |
Convicted | Neuwied – Koblenz railway line | |
Subjugated | Rhine | |
place | Urmitz - Neuwied ( Engers ) | |
Entertained by | Deutsche Bahn | |
construction | Truss bridge | |
overall length | 430 m | |
Longest span | 188 m | |
height | 9.4 m | |
start of building | 1916, 1953 | |
completion | 1918, 1954 | |
location | ||
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Map of the railway facilities in the greater Koblenz area | ||
The Urmitz railway bridge or Rhine bridge Engers-Urmitz - built in the First World War as the Crown Prince Wilhelm Bridge and blown up at the end of the Second World War - has crossed the Rhine in its current form as a double - track truss bridge since 1954 between Urmitz and Neuwied on the Neuwied-Koblenz railway line .
history
A previous bridge was built for strategic military reasons between 1916 and 1918 under the name Kronprinz-Wilhelm-Brücke or Kronprinzenbrücke for short. It was named after the German Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia . Originally this bridge spanned the Rhine as a truss arch bridge . It was part of a bridge family made up of three similar, strategically motivated railway bridges over the Rhine. The other two bridges were the Ludendorff Bridge near Remagen and the Hindenburg Bridge near Rüdesheim .
During the Second World War , the Kronprinz-Wilhelm-Brücke was blown up on March 9, 1945 at around 7:30 a.m. by German pioneers, although hundreds of fleeing German soldiers were still on the bridge. With the destruction, the crossing to the right bank of the Rhine should be prevented for advancing American troops. The Wehrmacht soldiers fell into the ice-cold Rhine with their vehicles and horses. The number of victims could never be determined. The demolition was preceded by violent reactions within the Wehrmacht and the Führer Headquarters regarding the capture of the Remagen Bridge on March 7, 1945.
On May 7, 1945, an American bomber, documenting the effects of the previous air raids as part of the so-called " trolley missions ", crashed into the remains of the bridge while flying low. The 19 occupants of the aircraft were killed.
In 1953/54 the bridge was restored as a truss bridge. On the left and right of the railway bridge there is a footpath on which an accident occurred in August 2000 when a rider led her horse over it by the reins. A floor slab broke off at the side, and the horse fell into the river and swam almost unharmed to the bank.
In 2012, on the 67th anniversary of the destruction, a memorial stone was unveiled to the victims of the hastily demolished bridge.
Monument protection
The Urmitzer railway bridge is a protected cultural monument according to the Monument Protection Act (DSchG) and entered in the list of monuments of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate . It is in the Urmitz district .
See also
Web links
- The Rhine bridge Engers-Urmitz at brueckenweb.de
- Rhine bridge Engers-Urmitz. In: Structurae
- Crown Prince Wilhelm Bridge. In: Structurae
- The demolition of the Kronprinz-Wilhelm-Brücke - A report on the 10th anniversary in the Bendorfer Zeitung
- Damian Morcinek: A life with the Rhine bridge: Paul Maßfeller remembers , rhein-zeitung.de of July 18, 2018
Individual evidence
- ↑ Christoph Gunkel: Historical aerial photos: photo shots in deep flight . In: Spiegel Online . May 10, 2010 ( spiegel.de [accessed July 19, 2019]).
- ↑ Markus Lenz: Plane crash near Neuwied in the Engers district on the Urmitzer railway bridge. Retrieved July 19, 2019 .
- ^ Rhein-Zeitung of August 28, 2000. Accessed March 8, 2015.
- ↑ Urmitz: Memorial to commemorate victims of the bridge blowing in 1945 in: Rhein-Zeitung , March 2, 2012
- ↑ General Directorate for Cultural Heritage Rhineland-Palatinate (ed.): Informational directory of cultural monuments - District Mayen-Koblenz (PDF; 1.7 MB), Koblenz 2013
The next bridge upstream: Bendorfer Bridge |
Bridges over the Rhine |
The next bridge downstream: Caesar's Rhine bridges (historical, 55 BC) Raiffeisen bridge (Neuwied) |