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October 26, 2008

Red Deer Creek Bridge Collapse

A friend of mine and I had plans to watch today's Cowboy game, but he called me just before I was getting ready to leave and told me he was having to detour traffic at the bridge in Miami.

He said there was a huge hole in the bridge so I thought I'd just go down and see for myself.

I made it across the bridge just fine; the highway crew was keeping the one lane closed, of course.


All truck traffic heading to the north of Miami on Hwys. 282 and 283 would have to reroute via Canadian or go all the way on Hwy. 60 and cut across on the Hoover hwy.

The hole wasn't as big as I thought it would be, but it was still large enough to be scary.


I decided I'd slip off down the creek, get under the bridge and take a photo of the hole from below.

Coincidentally enough, the last time I had been under the bridge was with my friend's female cousin. She went down there quite willingly, but slapped my face after the first kiss.


Looking at the underside of the rest of the bridge, I was struck as to how many other places looked as though they could crumble and fall at any moment.

I was horrified at how thin the pavement was...and dismayed to think that most of our nation's infrastructure is probably in the same shape.

I suppose "collapse" was a bit of hyperbole.

2 comments:

sharintexas said...

Gosh, I remember having to detour to the creek bottom to get to town when they were building the "new" bridge. Guess it was a good thing it doesn't rain very often in the Panhandle or we would have had to go way out of our way to get to school. Guess things aren't really any different now, are they?

Mike said...

I wrote Sharon P. and sent her the pics; I was standing there talking w/ Joe when she drove by. I told her about remembering when the bridge had washed out; I was just a little bitty guy, but certainly remember it. I also believe that Mrs. Saul's husband was killed when huge cottonwood tree came around the corner during a flash flood and wiped out the structure.

I don't have the link right off hand, but if you'll search "Red Deer Creek" you'll get this post and another I had posted with the creek full to the banks, probably around 1976.