Getting a mobile crane off a collapsed bridge is not a simple matter, Ministry of Public Works (MOPT) officials found Thursday. The driver of the massive 84-ton Quiros S.A. mobile crane tried to cross a Bailey bridge on the General Cañas Highway Tuesday afternoon with disastrous results.

The bridge, with a load-bearing limit of 40 tons, collapsed, causing a nightmare for commuters on the San Jose-Heredia and Alajuela route. The driver of the mobile crane was fined 94,000 colones by MOPT for not having a permit to cross the bridge.

However, Roberto Quiros of the Quiros construction firm says he will appeal his driver’s fine. He denied that driver Albero Marin needed a permit to use the route.

MOPT announced it would replace the bridge and salvage the steel girders of it to repair some of the numerous Bailey bridges in the country. But it is difficult to imagine that much of the collapsed structure, looking like a plate of steel spaghetti, is more than scrap iron.

Meanwhile, nothing much could be done until the mobile crane was removed from the twisted structure. MOPT announced that it would use two similar mobile units to move the offending Quiros company machine.

Fortunately, MOPT already had built a large culvert under the Bailey bridge which had been installed hastily in July when erosion caused by a plugged smaller culvert had washed out a large section of the highway.

The task remained, working the entire weekend, for MOPT crews to dump 3,500 cubic meters of landfill on top of the culvert–after removing the crane and wreckage of the ruined Bailey bridge, of course.

The hapless bridge is one of four Bailey bridges rushed in to bridge the washed out hole in July and were never meant as more than a temporary measure.

MOPT prepared the scene for the two cranes with great care, aware of public disgust with the whole bridge situation in the country. They laid a “runway” of gravel down for the giant rescue crane, with a 500-ton capacity, Wednesday night, preparing for the removal of the stranded 84-ton crane from the ruined structure.

Meanwhile, the national newspaper La Nacion reported traffic backed up from 2 to 10 kilometers long as a result to the blockage. Drivers reported traffic jams all over town on Thursday, as most tried to find alternate routes which in turn caused snarls on most major arteries around the Central Valley.