NTL Record

Title Application of Radiographic Testing to Multilayered Gusset Plate Inspection : [techbrief]
Record ID 66100
Personal Name
Contributor
Ocel, Justin M.
Corporate Creator United States. Federal Highway Administration. Office of Research, Development, and Technology
Corporate
Contributor
Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center
Publisher United States. Federal Highway Administration. Office of Research, Development, and Technology
Publication Date 20121001
Language English
Abstract On August 1, 2007, the I-35W bridge collapsed in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The bridge was a three-span (255- by 456- by 255-ft) continuous subdivided Warren deck truss over the Mississippi River. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigated the collapse and leveraged technical assistance from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). NTSB determined that the cause of the collapse was due to undersized gusset plates at a particular node location on the main truss. In response to the I-35W collapse, FHWA and the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials conducted an experimental program to investigate the structural behavior of gusset plates. This research program tested 13 gusset plate connections to failure, meaning they could no longer support external loads. Four of these experimental connections had simulated section loss in the gusset plates to investigate the role of deterioration on the overall behavior of the connection. This offered a unique opportunity to test nondestructive evaluation (NDE) technologies on real gusset plate connections in a controlled environment with a known level of section loss. The following sections describe the results attained through radiographic testing (RT) of two multilayer gusset plate specimens.
Rosap ID dot:40930
Rosap URL https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/40930
TRT Terms Gusset plates; Radiography; Deterioration; Structural connection
Geographical
Coverage
United States
Report Number FHWA-HRT-12-071
Resource type Tech Report
URL https://ntlrepository.blob.core.windows.net/lib/66000/66100/66100/FHWA-HRT-12-071.pdf
Alternative URL https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/infrastructure/structures/bridge/12071/index.cfm
Format PDF
Database NTL Digital Repository