Stories you shouldn’t miss:
1. Caltrans used the same type of badly designed steel rods that have snapped on the new Bay Bridge in its retrofit of the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge a decade ago, the Chron$ reports, citing newly released agency documents. Two years before the Richmond Bridge project, Caltrans had banned the use of such high-strength rods on bridges because the bolts can become brittle and snap in an earthquake. But the agency decided to use the bolts anyway on the Bay Bridge, too, after its main supplier, Dyson Corporation, pointed to their use on the Richmond Bridge. However, experts note that the bolts on the Richmond Bridge are much less likely to fail because they are not under the same intense pressure as they are the new Bay Bridge.
