Bay Bridge reopens after six-day closure for emergency repairs

Nov 2, 2009, 18:01 GMT

San Francisco - The San Francisco Bay Bridge reopened Monday after a nearly week-long closure for emergency repairs.

The bridge, which links San Francisco to cities to the east and is used by 280,000 vehicles, was shut down after five tons of metal crashed down on the bridge last Tuesday at a place where workers had made repairs months earlier.

The iconic Golden Gate Bridge, that links San Francisco to northern California remained open throughout the week, but traffic throughout the region snarled up and ridership on public transport reached record levels.

No one was seriously injured in the Bay Bridge incident, but engineers warned that the failure could cause the bridge to collapse in high winds. Workers replaced two rods and a crossbar, which had become weakened through vibrations and frictions caused by the bridge's movement, and completed stress tests early Monday, said a spokesman for the California transit authority CalTrans.

'I know that it's been difficult,' said Bart Ney. 'But we're happy to be returning the Bay Bridge to public service.'