Transport and installation of the Pont Gustave Flaubert - a vertical-lift bridge over the River Seine in Rouen , France
SMIT Transport & Heavy Lift Europe of Rotterdam ( now part of Boskalis ) received the contract for transport and installation of the Pont Gustave Flaubert . Bridge parts were built at two construction sites :
� Wondelgen , Belgium , at Victor Buyck Steel Construction , and
� Lauterbourg , France , at Ce Eiffel Construction Metallique
Both bridge sections were transported to Rotterdam via inland waterways and transferred on to a single barge for transportation to Rouen . The main parts of the bridge are a 1,200-tons deck section , 120 metres long and 17.3 metres wide ; and two so-called ‘ butterflies ’, each 450- tons .
On 16 th and 17 th August 2006 , the SMIT sheerleg ‘ Taklift 7 ’ fitted with its 130 m long boom , lifted the two butterflies on to the support towers . The bridge deck section was lifted on August 23 into position in a tandem lift using the ‘ Taklift 7 ’ ( 1,600-ton SWL ) and the ‘ Matador 3 ’ ( at that time 1,500-ton SWL ). The operation took just two hours . For this lift , the ‘ Taklift 7 ’ was brought back into its normal A-frame configuration .
The strong current in the River Seine ( up to 3-4 knots ) imposed tight time constraints on the lift , which had to take place during the brief period of relatively slack current .
West Bridge of the Great Belt Bridge , Denmark
One of the main vessels for the construction of the West Bridge of the Great Belt Bridge ( Storebælt ) in Denmark was the custom-built heavy lift vessel ‘ Svanen ’ with a lifting capacity of 7,000-ton .
On behalf of the joint venture European Storebælt Group with the Dutch contractors Ballast Nedam as secretary this vessel was built by Grootint B . V . in The Netherlands .
The HLV ‘ Svanen ’ was used to handle the following bridge |
components : |
� foundation caissons : |
6,000-ton |
� bridge pillars : |
1,800-ton |
� bridge parts of road bridge : |
5,800-ton |
� bridge parts of railway bridge : |
4,500-ton |
The West Bridge was built between 1989 and 1994 . It is a combined road and railway bridge with a total length of 6,611 metres . The bridge consists of two parallel bridges , one for the road and one for the railway . The elements for it were installed by ‘ Svanen ’, comprising 63 bridge spans : 51 spans of 110.40m and 12 spans of 81.75m .
The Spanish Company Dragados Offshore delivered fortynine spans with a total weight of 245.000-ton .
The transportation from Cadiz , Spain to Denmark was performed in 25 shipments ( every 21 days ) with two spans per shipment . The weight per span was approximately 5,000-tons .
Transportation operations were performed by Smit Transport & Heavy Lift Division , using their 24,000-ton deadweight barges ' Giant 3 ' and ' Giant 4 ’. These 140 metre long barges were delivered to their destination by the tugs ‘ Suhaili ’ and ‘ Sumatras ’ of International Transport Contractors ( now Tschudi Offshore & Towage ).
← Figures 28 and 29 : Sheerlegs ´ Taklift 7 ´ and ´ Matador 3 ´ in a tandem lift
3 / 2018
↑ Figure 30 : ´ Svanen ´ Photo Credit : Ballast Nedam