Organized Labor

Building Trades crews went to extraordinary efforts to repair the Bay Bridge after the recent fix on the cracked eyebar failed, forcing the bridge to close for six days in late October.

Mike Theriault, Secretary-Treasurer of the SF Building Trades Council, said bridge fixes are tremendously complicated, especially on aging structures, and because of the limitations of engineering knowledge and of bridge design, there is little consensus on former and present repairs.
“Our workmanship has always answered the call,” Theriault said. “But both engineers from their studies and we from our experience know the complexity of bridge design and behavior and the consequent persistence of some level of unpredictability in bridges.”

Pat Karinen, Senior Field Rep of Pile Drivers 34, praised the commitment of the crews to making the necessary repairs and getting the bridge reopened. “Our members went beyond the call of duty to get the job done,” he said. “If you want a bridge built or fixed, these are the guys I want doing it. That’s what they do.”

The repair of the Bay Bridge was accomplished by a crew of 30 workers from the Ironworkers, Laborers, Pile Drivers and Operating Engineers unions who worked around the clock for six days after the bridge was closed.

Crews repaired a brace structure that held in place an eyebar that was found to be cracked during the Labor Day weekend roll-in of a new section of the bridge just east of Yerba Buena Island. That discovery delayed opening of the bridge by about two hours, after the crews installed the special brace around the eyebar to carry the load. On Oct. 27, the 5,000 pound metal structure fell onto the bridge after high winds snapped the metal rods that held it in place. No one was injured in the accident that damaged three cars and ended up closing the bridge for six days. It was the longest closure of the bridge since the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake shut it for one month.

While commuters checked news reports and made alternative plans to get into and out of the City – jamming the regions’ other bridges and increasing ridership on BART to record numbers – construction workers performed the dangerous work high up on the bridge to fit a new brace and new tension rods.

Iron Workers local 377 Business Agent John Rocha said that during the Bay Bridge shutdown, the union sent him and Business Agent Terry Dunnigan to the job site to check on the work crew. “They did an exemplary job and were recognized by Caltrans for their professionalism and dedication under adverse conditions,” Rocha said. During the repair there were reports of wind gusts of 40 to 50 miles per hour.

At a press conference announcing the reopening of the bridge Nov. 2, Caltrans Director Randy Iwasaki thanked the crews from general Contractor NCM Construction, Danny’s Construction (DCCI), and Abar, which did the stress testing on the rods when they were replaced.

“When the eyebar structure crack was discovered on Labor Day weekend, we saw no evidence then or now that the bridge was at risk of failure,” Iwasaki said. “But we know small problems can become big problems so we worked to make sure the problem didn’t become a big one.” He said a team of consultants from the federal highway administration, additional outside experts from Caltrans’ seismic safety review board, and another outside expert were involved in doing some of the reviews to make sure the job was done safely.

Iwasaki said the overall goal was to make sure the bridge remains safe. He said that inspectors found that the eyebar crack had not gotten any worse since the Labor Day weekend repair, but one of the tie rods failed as a result of high winds. He said the failure wasn’t a result of bad workmanship or a flaw in the design but showed the difference between controlled tests in a lab and the real conditions where high winds caused movement of the tie rods, which were weakened and ultimately failed as a result of metal rubbing against metal.

For the original eyebar brace installation, Caltrans engineer Mike Forner said the10-person crew that installed the brace to strengthen the cracked eyebar needed about 18 to 24 hours to attach the saddles, then another four to six hours to properly set the tension on the tie-rods. The new repair took longer as crews tested and retested the tie rods and made sure they did not rub against other metal parts of the bridge structure. After the tie-rods and bracket assembly was repaired, work crews performed a stress tests Saturday evening Oct. 31 to see if the metal parts were still scraping against each other. They determined that the tie rods were continuing to scrape together and spent the next day realigning the assembly and grinding and smoothing the metal parts. John Rocha said that the hole the rods were aligned through were enlarged and rubber dampeners were installed to lessen the vibrations and friction.

Caltrans spokesman Bart Ney said that the new fix wasn’t a substantially different from the original design but it included modifications designed to keep the brace from moving and the tension rods from rubbing against the brace. Crews ground the sides of metal holes designed for large nuts that stabilized the original repair, then installed the nuts, checked the alignment, and removed them again to make further adjustments, Ney said. Workers tested the fix by slowly tightening the steel rods and installed anti-vibration crossbeams.

“So if we’re correct that the rod failed because of the movement during the wind and if we’re successful in preventing that movement, then we have every reason to believe that these rods are going to hold when this fix is complete,” Ney said.

Caltrans officials said that they would increase routine inspections of the bridge and the repair and install monitors to watch for unwanted movement that could cause another failure. If the newest repair should break, officials said, pieces of metal have been attached to the bridge to keep the patch from falling. Caltrans’ chief engineer Richard Land said the repair was “a temporary fix,” and that a long-term solution might be needed. “Right now the plan is not to keep the current (repair) in place long term,” he said. Future bridge closures may be necessary for long-term repairs – including possible replacement of the cracked eyebar.