El Ferdan Bridge, Egypt: the world's longest swing bridge

Abstract

The world's longest span swing bridge was opened on 14 November 2001 by President Mubarak of Egypt. The combined road and rail bridge crosses the Suez Canal close to the Egyptian town of Ismailia. The adopted solution, based on an illustrative design provided by the client, Egyptian National Railways, is a double swing bridge with a steel truss superstructure and a span of 340 m between pivot pier centrelines. The total weight of the bridge is 13 200 t. This paper describes the procurement, design and construction of this unusual project.