ISLAMABAD: The Bhara Kahu bypass project saw another accident within a few days as its five girders collapsed apparently due to flaws in their launching.

The under-construction transom of a flyover collapsed on Saturday killing two labourers. Fortunately, however, no human life or property loss was reported on Thursday.

The project worth Rs6.5 billion is being executed by the National Logistics Cell (NLC). On Wednesday, four girders were launched and on Thursday the incident took place during the placement of the fifth, 45-metre-long girder.

CCTV footage showed that the fifth girder was being placed with the help of a crane over the RCC pad when it suddenly overturned hitting the adjacent four girders. Within seconds, all the five girders collapsed.

Five girders collapse, no loss of life or damage to property reported

The back-to-back incidents raised a big question mark on the efficiency of the contractor - NLC - and the consultant supervisors, causing panic among the public.

“Two incidents within a few days is something alarming; there should be quality audit of all projects,” said an official.

Meanwhile, on the direction of CDA Chairman Noorul Amin Mengal, an inquiry committee headed by Member Engineering Syed Munawar Shah and comprising officials of Nespak and NLC has been formed to ascertain the reasons behind the collapse of girders.

The CDA chairman tweeted: “Mobilising third party validation for execution work and design being conducted at Barakahu project to ascertain cause of accident today. The facts will be shared. The public concerns and safety are appreciated and will be best protected. IA.”

When contacted, the member engineering said the incident seemed to be a result of human error while launching the girder.

“Though I am not defending the incident, in development projects human errors often occur. Thanks God, no human life and property loss was reported. Today’s incident does not relate to quality of work, but it seems a result of a mistake in launching the girders,” he said.

The member said the project was being carried out in accordance with best international standards.

“We are upset, the earlier incident took place because of an overloaded truck which hit our shuttering and today one girder which was wrongly placed hit four others and all collapsed,” he said.

In reply to a question, an engineer of the CDA said four girders were already connected through welding and after launching total six the contractor was supposed to do diaphragm work. But all of a sudden the girders collapsed.

On the other hand, a video showed collapsing girders behaving very brittle. Officials said girders were designed to bear heavy load in vertical shape as they had pre-stressing wires.

The second incident also raised questions as to why the safety measure of cordoning off the work zone was not taken. In the footage, a couple of people could be seen moving here and there near the work zone.

But a CDA official said the area was completely cordoned off and no one was allowed to enter the work zone and the persons in the video were labourers, adding because of the complete cordoning off no life or property was lost.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif inaugurated work on the bypass project on September 30 and directed the CDA to complete it within three months.

The project has a five-kilometre-road with a bridge and five underpasses besides one kilometre elevated flyover.

Published in Dawn, March 3rd, 2023