Bridge joint pops motorists’ tires

WASILLA — A worn-out joint on the Parks Highway bridge over Seward Meridian Parkway popped tires on about a dozen vehicles during rush hour traffic Thursday.

“Essentially, it was an expansion joint in the bridge,” Alaska Department of Transportation spokesman Rick Feller said. “It separated away from the bridge decking and that caused a piece of the expansion joint to actually elevate above the decking level and did cause damage to many car tires that passed over it.”

Expansion joints are typically installed in bridges to account for the expansion and contraction of building materials due to the temperature and to allow for bridge movement during earthquakes, Feller said.

Reports of just how many cars were involved ranged from six to more than a dozen. Feller said he saw quite a few on his drive home.

“I live off Seward Meridian myself and was driving by there and personally saw cars that had stopped and were changing tires,” Feller said.

He said he knew something was wrong.

“You don’t typically see several cars at the same time that are stopping to change tires at the same location,” Feller said.

He said a welded joint on the underside of the bridge was the culprit.

“Over time, that weld had been worn and let go,” Feller said. “That’s what caused that part of the expansion joint to kick above the level of the decking.”

He said that each bridge in the state is checked every two years. Asked if he knew when the bridge had last been inspected, Feller said he did not.

“I’m not sure whether it would have been scheduled for this year or had been inspected last year,” he said.

He said crews began work repairing it immediately.

“We got the bridge blocked off and I’m not really sure of the schedule, but it was later on that evening when we had removed the damaged part and had restored traffic across the bridge,” he said.

The Seward Meridian bridge would be a tough one for the Parks Highway to do without, but Feller said it wasn’t ever completely closed.

“I think at the worst part, it was restricted to a single lane of traffic so it never was fully put out of service,” he said.

Central Mat-Su Assistant Fire Chief Michael Keenan said that since there wasn’t a car accident or other need for rescuers or paramedics, his department didn’t respond to the bridge.

“They were getting plenty of 911 calls about it. We were just made aware of it, but we didn’t respond out there,” he said.

Frontiersman readers who spotted a notice about the debris on the bridge and traffic delays on the newspaper’s Facebook page quickly corrected emergency band radio’s description of the “debris” in the roadway.

“It was NOT debris,” wrote one reader. “There were more than a dozen vehicles with popped tires. My vehicle is the black Silverado in the picture above. I have already made my phone call to the DOT.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.