Wiehltalbrücke

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Coordinates: 50 ° 58 ′ 31 ″  N , 7 ° 29 ′ 26 ″  E

A4 Wiehltalbrücke
Wiehltalbrücke
Wiehltalbrücke and company premises of the Edelstahlwerk Kind & Co. in the foreground
use Federal motorway 4
Subjugated Wiehl , Wiehltalbahn
place Weiershagen
overall length 705 m
width 30.25 m
height 60 m
completion 1971
location
Wiehltalbrücke (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Wiehltalbrücke

The Wiehltalbrücke is a valley bridge of the federal motorway 4 between Cologne and Olpe over the Wiehl valley near Gummersbach in the Oberbergisches Kreis in North Rhine-Westphalia , Germany, completed in 1971 . Weiershagen , which belongs to Wiehl, is located below the beam bridge. The bridge is 30.25 meters wide, 705 meters long and has an area of ​​21,326 square meters. Their greatest height above ground is 60 meters. The superstructure is a steel structure for both directions of travel, the roller bearings of which rest on reinforced concrete pillars.

Serious accident in 2004

Wiehltalbrücke August 26, 2004, the burnt out tanker next to the neighboring houses
Wiehltalbahn under the Wiehltalbrücke

On August 26, 2004, a tanker truck loaded with 32,000 liters of fuel fell off the bridge after a collision with a car and caught fire. The truck driver was killed. The guardrails and the safety ropes embedded there could not intercept the truck, as they were only designed for vehicles up to a maximum of 13 tons. Parts of the bridge were so badly damaged by the fire that it had to be closed from August 26 to October 7, 2004 due to insufficient load-bearing capacity. During this time, a temporary repair took place.

According to the insurance company, the Wiehltalbrücken accident was the most expensive road traffic accident in the Federal Republic of Germany to date, at 30 million euros.

The perpetrator, who was 26 years old at the time of the accident and under the influence of drugs, was found guilty of negligent homicide on September 14, 2005 by the Gummersbach district court , jury court, in the act of deliberately endangering road traffic in the act of deliberate driving without a driver's license and false suspicion and was sentenced to a total imprisonment sentenced to one year and ten months. The verdict became final on February 9, 2006 after the appeals were withdrawn. Then the convict had to serve the sentence. His brother, who owned the car and was a passenger in the car, was fined in a separate trial for first designating himself as a driver to protect his younger brother, who did not have a driver's license.

repair

After a provisional repair with 27 additional steel struts and the excavation of around 10,000 tons of fuel contaminated soil, the actual repair by the State Office for Road Construction in North Rhine-Westphalia and the companies commissioned by it began in the summer vacation of 2006.

During the repair, a 600 square meter bridge section was removed and replaced with a new steel structure. On this scale, it was a one-off project that had never taken place anywhere before. At the same time, among other things, the road surface of the bridge was renovated.

The motorway was therefore completely closed from June 28 to August 22, 2006. The traffic was diverted via surrounding country roads.

The bridge was completely opened to traffic on October 18, 2007.

Reactions

Due to the strong media response, around 20,000 euros were collected in a fundraising campaign that was initiated in favor of the family of the truck driver who was killed in the accident - originally as a neighborhood campaign.

In the summer of 2006, the village community, directly adjacent to the accident site, erected a permanent memorial together with the driver's family and with the support of the city of Wiehl.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ A4: Repair of the Wiehltalbrücke begins - full closure from June 28th to August 21st. ( Memento of July 15, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) Straßen.NRW press release, March 6, 2006.
  2. ↑ World premiere at the Wiehl valley bridge. ( Memento from July 16, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) WDR.de, July 13, 2006, accessed April 15, 2007.
  3. ↑ District Court Gummersbach, judgment of September 14, 2005, 10a Ls 22/05. September 14, 2005, accessed July 28, 2019 .
  4. ↑ Wiehltalbrücke - judgment is valid . In: Kölnische Rundschau of February 9, 2006, accessed April 24, 2017
  5. ^ Wiehltalbrücke: Brother sentenced to 2700 EURO . In: Kölnische Rundschau of April 8, 2006, accessed April 24, 2017
  6. ↑ A4: Wiehltalbrücke remains closed . State Office for Road Construction North Rhine-Westphalia. August 27, 2004. Archived from the original on February 2, 2014. Retrieved January 31, 2014.

Web links

 Wikinews: Cause of the Wiehl Valley motorway bridge accident sentenced to prison term  - news