Work began this morning to remove a railroad bridge in Sioux City that collapsed in June during flooding on the big Sioux River. Charges were set off on the span of the bridge that is on the South Dakota side of the river in North Sioux City.
Amy McBeth of the Burlington Northern Sante Fe Railroad is overseeing the operation. “The charges will help make it easier and safer to get that span up and out of the water,” she says.
Crews started removing the span shortly after the explosive charges were set off. McBeth says they’ll set off charges on the span on the Iowa side of at a future date. They will then put up a new bridge.
“We’re in the design process of that right now. We need to get the permits that are required. We need to get the material that it’s required,” McBeth says. “So once we have those things, we estimate it’ll be about a nine month process for us to reconstruct this bridge.” McBeth says it will take crews around one week to remove the debris from the bridge span on the South Dakota side.
(By Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City)