Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2016/10/13/bridge-demolition-fails-in-spe.html
…
2 Likes
Stop! You’re just making it angry! You won’t like it if it’s angry!
8 Likes
This video is hard to see in blog view. When can we expect a fix?
2 Likes
There’s a really weird visual effect right after the explosion: the camera goes up slightly, comes back down, and then it suddenly looks like the bridge moves about 10 feet backwards.
I don’t know if it’s an optical illusion caused by the smoke moving to the right, or if it’s YouTube trying to perform image stabilization based on said smoke.
In any case, it’s kind of trippy.
2 Likes
Or maybe the structure actually shifts.
3 Likes
I’ll take “bad demolition contractor” for $500. When you contractor selection criteria is limited to lowest bidder, this is sometimes the result.
12 Likes
Or that. I forgot I was going to say that.
2 Likes
Reminds me of the scene in that WW2 movie, is it The Bridge at Remagen, where the German army try to blow up the last bridge over the Rhine — maybe this is spoiler territory, but the movie’s nearly fifty years old now — but fail because they use the wrong grade of explosives.
1 Like
And then they all whistle that tune and the guy falls on the detonator, right?
Oh, wait, how many movies are there about blowing up bridges in WWII?
5 Likes
Had it been shot in portrait then gravity could have finished the job. But, oh no, landscape nazis know best.
18 Likes
Somebody was explaining to me that those “image shimmys” were because of the type of lens used in cell-phones… I don’t know how true that is.
We need to discuss the use of “spectacular”.
8 Likes
“WHOOOO! F YEAH! Nothing happened! The bridge didn’t flinch! GO TEAM BRIDGE!”
6 Likes
There’s been a few: A Bridge Too Far, Die Brucke, Pegasus Bridge, The Bridges of Madison County. And blowing up bridges (or, rarely, building them) is often a feature of WW2 movies.
2 Likes
Better to fail with a lesser amount of explosives than take the “blow it up real good” approach, especially when you’ve turned it into a spectator event. See, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Canberra_Hospital_implosion. It isn’t mentioned in the Wikipedia article but I believe the demolition folks in that case greatly increased the amount of explosives to try and ensure a successful implosion.
Good gods - what do they do in this kind of case? They can’t safely climb on it surely, and it would difficult to deal with it without being able to do that.
3 Likes
They don’t break 'em like they used to.
2 Likes
I’ve got to know who goofed!
Also “epic.”
2 Likes
How about “Gentleman” while we’re at it, or is that one settled?
