TOWER CRANES help KOREAN BRIDGE TO TAKE SHAPE

The new Inchon International Airport, under construction in Korea, looks set to be a key hub for air travel in eastern Asia. The first phase, scheduled to open in 2001, is designed to have the capacity to handle 170,000 aircraft and 27m passengers a year. Within 20 years the passenger numbers are forecasted to reach 100m a year.

Success of the airport depends heavily on its road and rail links to downtown Seoul, 50km away, and beyond. The Inchon International Airport Expressway is Korea’s first build, operate, transfer (BOT) project and the $2.3bn cost is being met by a combination of public and private funding.

More than $670m of the cost is on the 4.42km Yongjong Grand bridge, which connects the mainland to the island on which the airport is being built. Designed by a Korean-Japanese collaboration of Yooshin Corporation and Chodai, the bridge lays claim to being not only the world’s first two-storey, self-anchored suspension bridge with a road and railway, but also the first to use three dimensional cable. Six lanes of road traffic will run on the 41m-wide upper deck, while 11m below on the 35m-wide lower deck two further lanes of traffic run on either side of twin railway tracks.

Main span of this bridge is 500m long and is supported by cables attached to two 105m-high diamond-shaped steel towers at 300m centres, and by reinforced concrete piers at 125m intervals. This section is set between 750m of truss span and 1,140m of steel box girder span on one side, and 1,500m of truss span and 480m of box girder span on the other side.

Construction is divided between four contractors: Samsung (lead contractor with a 29% share), Hanjin Engineering & Construction, Kolon Engineering & Construction and Dongah Engineering & Construction.

A fleet of six Potain tower cranes are being used by Samsung and Hanjin to lift and place reinforcement and formwork panels, as well as for cement pours and other lifting duties. The cranes on site include a model H30/30C, featuring a 60m hook height and a 40m jib, and with a maximum lifting capacity of 12t. The cranes, some of which are on hire, were delivered by local Potain distributor Korea International.

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