Update Number 2 on Partial Collapse of RiDOT Bridge - The Public Can Help! (see pinned comment)

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00]Well, hi everyone. I've got another update for you today on the partial bridge collapse that occurred on April 24th, 2026 in Cranston, Rhode Island. It was a highway bridge ramp where about a 100 foot section of the concrete parapit wall and the attached metal electrical shielding wall came crashing down onto the active Amtrak tracks. I'm recording this video on April 29th, 2026. I want to go more into the technical aspects of what I think happened and the technical things that I believe Ryot and other government officials should be addressing with the public and so far they haven't in my opinion. So, as I mentioned before, this is the route 10 north ramp going to I 95 north in Cranston, Rhode Island. This is an aerial shot. We're talking about the south side of the bridge where this entire wall came crashing down. This is a Google Street view of this ramp as we're going on to the north. And the wall that fell off the bridge is going to be located on the left hand side of these photos. So, we've got this concrete parapit wall, a steel guard rail. There's another railing, steel railing on the top of the parapit wall.

[00:01:18]And then you've got this flat metal barrier wall that extends above the parapit wall for protection from the electrical lines that power the Amtrak locomotives that run on the lines down below. This is a picture of a standard parapit wall. This is from uh Pennsylvania. I show it to give you a better idea of what this wall would look like behind the guard rail and below this shielding wall. This is the backside of one of these shielding walls as it attaches to the outside of the parapit wall. So, I think acting DOT director Bob Brachio has provided some statements that don't make a lot of sense to me in this episode. He's indicating that it's somehow the barrier wall that caused the problem. Clearly, it looks like it's the parapit wall that became detached from the bridge deck and brought everything down with it. From the prior inspection reports, this is from the most recent inspection done in March of 2025. You can see evidence of prior collisions with vehicles against this wall here. So, obviously, this this can lever wall has to be designed to withstand wind loading on this flat metal barrier wall surface as well as potential impacts from vehicles hitting the side of the guardrail and the parapit wall. Now, to me, it looks like there's two potential modes of failure here of this canal levered parapit wall, and that is sliding along the base or overturning from the top. And if you look at these photos in the immediate aftermath of this collapse, it's a very smooth surface. And I had wondered at the time whether there was any pre-demolition saw cutting activity to create such a relatively clean surface.

[00:02:59]And I wish ride officials would state whether that parapit wall was actually dowled or had reinforcing steel connecting it to the bridge deck because I don't understand how it could break away so cleanly. Now some of you reached out to me and indicated that in the late 50s early 60s it was common to construct these parapit walls after the bridge deck concrete had cured. So you would have what's called a coal joint there and no actual physical connection between the two surfaces just from you just have resistance from friction. It seems implausible to me that Amtrak would ask Ry dot to have these barriers installed which would increase the weight on the parapit wall and also increase the wind loading perhaps significantly. Somehow that loading would be expected to be resisted solely from the self-weight of that parapit wall system. And this appears to be the base of that parapit wall. You could see a line of rusty steel, but I can't imagine all of that steel breaking out flush with the base of the parapit wall.

[00:04:10]It just doesn't make any sense. So, this photo suggests to me that there wasn't a connection from the parapit wall into the bridge deck. But again, that's just seems really shocking to me if that's the case. But you can't dispute the fact that that's a very clean and relatively smooth surface that was exposed after the parapit wall fell off and took the barrier wall with it down to the Amtrak lines below. Now, some of you had mentioned in the comments to my previous videos that you wondered if that big snow event in February resulted in snow being plowed and pushed up against the parapit wall and this barrier wall. And I think it's an interesting suggestion.

[00:04:50]Although if that were to occur, that would suggest that there may have been some displacement or distress to the wall that was there for nearly two months before this wall actually failed or perhaps longer. So, I don't know.

[00:05:06]It's an interesting idea. I don't have any evidence to support that at this point. Now, my most recent video, my thumbnail title indicates, you know, let the cover up begin. And I'm just going to play you some of these news segments from WPRI.

[00:05:23]And I'll walk you through them here as we go.

[00:05:25]>> Both men say their priorities lie in reopening the ramp and securing the other bridges. Neither could provide a theory on how the barrier fell Friday or who should be held accountable. Yeah, we'll take a look at all the issues that relate directly to whose responsibility it is, but that investigations um in the process and ongoing.

[00:05:45]>> We don't know the cause of it. I I I can't speculate on the cause of why this happened, but we're looking into it and there's plenty of time to do that.

[00:05:52]>> Okay. So, they're not going to speculate. They say they're going to do an investigation. They don't give you a timeline for when they expect to complete such an investigation. There's no strong commitment on what form or when to actually share that information with the public. It just seems to me like they're slow walking any commitment for transparency relative to what happened here. And as I mentioned, it's a miracle that no one was injured or worse with this debris falling on the track. I mean, these trains can't stop on a dime. And it's completely plausible that this wall could have fallen directly on top of a passing train. I mean, look how fast these trains go through here.

[00:06:37]Okay, I'm going to play this next segment here where again they indicate that they were going to apply some type of retrofit to the other seven bridges that have this same configuration of the parapit wall with the attached Amtrak electrical barrier wall. Meanwhile, work is underway on seven additional bridges with the same safety barriers. Ry dot says they are inspecting those with plans to add reinforcements.

[00:07:03]>> So, we're not taking any chances. We're just uh going to remove all doubt and we're going to uh brace them.

[00:07:10]>> So, how do they know what they need to do to improve the stability of these parapit walls on these other bridges with this barrier wall attached? I mean, you just don't go out and blindly say, "Well, let's just do this or do that."

[00:07:24]It makes no sense. So, as I've indicated, I think they have a clear idea of what happened here. They at least have a working theory, and they have to in order to know what they need to do for the similarly constructed bridges. So, clearly, they're not sharing what their idea is about what caused this wall failure. Ryot director Bob Rockio goes on to describe what they're actually doing to stabilize the walls on these other bridges. And it doesn't make sense to me.

[00:07:54]>> Similar to like when you have a bookshelf on a wall, you have that triangle um you know bracing underneath.

[00:08:00]So we're going to uh put like that triangle bracing that bookshelf type bracing underneath the parapits.

[00:08:07]>> Okay. I'm not sure why he would brace underneath the parapit wall. I'd like to see a detail actually of what they're doing. So, write please through your spokespeople or your spokesperson Charles St. Martin or others post a detail as to what you're actually doing to stabilize these other walls. And while you're at it, please post a detail of how this parapit wall was attached to the existing bridge deck in this instance of the wall failure and show if there actually is such an attachment.

[00:08:41]Now, here's a standard detail of a typical parapit wall that would be constructed today. So, on this side here on the left is the parapit wall. You can see continuous reinforcing that loops over the interior of the wall down into the underlying bridge deck. So, I'm curious, was there a similar type connection for this parapit wall to the existing bridge deck? And if so, what caused it to fail? So, I've got one more video segment that I want to play for you from this news story. And I think it illustrates in my view the root cause problem for these infrastructure projects in the state of Rhode Island. Namely, you have politicians who try and sound like engineers and you have engineers that sound just like politicians.

[00:09:29]>> Both men emphasize the work being done are precautionary measures. In an abundance of caution, the governor ordered uh he wants to put everybody uh at ease and he wants to make sure that everybody um knows that we um we absolutely secured those bridges.

[00:09:43]>> So why why is this process being directed by the governor? He's not an engineer. Let the engineers tell the governor what needs to be done and let the governor back that up as appropriate. I'll continue to follow this story. I've got several pending APER requests. Unfortunately, it takes a lot of time for Ry dot to fulfill these apper requests. If they actually do the normal course of things in my experience is you make the records request then they've got several days before they get back with you and typically say we're going to take more time before we get back with you. And then they say well now it's going to take so many hours to fulfill that request so send us money.

[00:10:26]So again, I appreciate all of you who have contributed to buy me a coffee.

[00:10:29]Those funds go to supporting these public records requests. So if you're so inclined, there's a link in the description to this video. I also want to thank the channel members and those of you who've contributed to Superthanks, additional ways to support this channel. So I'll continue to follow this story. I've got an email request for information into Amtrak. I think that's what it's going to take to divulge what actually happened in this instance. I'm not altogether confident at all that ride out officials or other Rhode Island state officials will essentially divulge what happened here in a timely fashion. I will say I think Bob Rockio is a much better much more credible spokesperson than his predecessor director Alvidi, but I have been disappointed in the lack of cander and directness from Mr. Rockio in this Cranston wall collapse incident. So I think he could do a lot better there.

[00:11:27]He's an engineer. I would encourage him to speak like an engineer and leave the politics and the political spin to others. That's that's my two cents on that. So thanks very much everyone.