Chenab Railway Bridge, world’s highest, inaugurated today in J&K; here’s the key features

Srinagar News: The 1.315 kms long bridge, built at a dizzying height of 359 metres -- can fit the entire Eiffel Tower (330 metres tall), plus roughly a 10-storied tall building below it.
chenab

Chenab Railway Bridge, world’s highest, inaugurated today in J&K

Photo : ANI
Srinagar: The Golden Joint of Chenab Railway Bridge, the world's highest railway bridge, constructed to link disparate parts of Jammu and Kashmir was inaugurated on Saturday. The Golden Joint is connecting the two ends of the deck of the world's highest railway bridge.
This is for the first time since India got its independence, Srinagar will be linked to the rest of India after the overarch deck on the world's highest single-arch railway bridge over Chenab River will be launched, reported ANI.
Sanjay Gupta, Chairman, and MD, Konkan Railway, speaking to ANI, said, "This has been a long journey. The term 'Golden Joint' was coined by civil engineers... It's the world's highest railway bridge."
Chants of 'Vande Matram' echoed as the golden joint of the world's highest railway bridge on Chenab River was completed today. The workers who worked on the project hoisted the National flag, and burn crackers to celebrate the historic moment.
“Local people will be benefited from the project. As this project started, we got an opportunity to work. Tourism will rise and we'll be able to earn more. Huge development is expected in this area now,” a worker told ANI.
"We can confidently state that the bridge would be roughly 98 percent complete after the golden joint is finished," said Giridhar Rajagopalan, Deputy Managing Director of Afcons.
"When we completed the arch closure project last year, we felt a great sense of relief about our ability to complete the project accurately so that there was no mismatch. And that gave us a great deal of confidence to easily handle the project`s balance portion. We are excitedly anticipating the upcoming golden joint milestone with NR and KRCL," Giridhar added as quoted by ANI.
Key features of Chenab Railway Bridge
  • Chenab Bridge is a famous bridge in Jammu & Kashmir with intricate engineering that had to overcome several challenges.
  • The geology, the harsh terrain, and the hostile environment were some of the few challenges that the engineers and railway officials had to face to get to this point.
  • The 1.315 kms long bridge, built at a dizzying height of 359 metres -- can fit the entire Eiffel Tower (330 metres tall), plus roughly a 10-storied tall building below it.
  • It is connecting the Salal-A and Dugga railway stations on either side of the bridge with the mighty River Chenab gushing below in the picture-postcard Reasi district.
  • The bridge comprises 93 deck segments, each weighing around 85 tonnes, launched simultaneously from both ends of the valley over the massive steel arch and work on joining five segments in full progress on the single line linking Katra (Jammu) with Qazigund (Kashmir), some 75 kms away.
  • Besides the Chenab Railway Bridge, Afcons is building 16 more railway bridges for Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL) in the dangerous terrain of Jammu and Kashmir. All these bridges are part of the ambitious Udhampur Srinagar Baramulla Rail Link (USBRL) project of the Northern Railways at an estimated cost of Rs 28,000 crore.
  • In under 70 days, four levels of concreting totalling over 1,550 cum were completed. The entire event took place in Jammu and Kashmir`s steep Sangaldan at a height of more than 90 meters above the surrounding countryside.
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