Recently, China Construction Industry Association has picked its top 10 industrial technology breakthroughs of the year. Pingtan Strait Rail-Road Bridge is a case of achieving the unthinkable! Pingtan is an island off E China’s Fujian province as well as the closest place on the mainland to the island of Taiwan.

Smacked at a hostile waterway is a "no-bridge" zone plagued by heavy winds of more than level 6 all year round. There, at a place where none has traversed before, Pingtan Strait Rail-Road Bridge miraculously stood above rocking waves, undulating seabeds, and naked rock surface.

According to Wang Donghui, chief engineer of Pingtan Strait Rail-Road Bridge, China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group Co., Ltd., the bridge builder, made a pontoon crane with a lifting capacity of 3,600 tons, equivalent to the weight of 2,400 cars.The uplift height is 110 meters, breaking the national lifting record in weight and height.

During the 7-year construction, the bridge builders also pioneered the rapid assembling technology of the buried combinatorial flatform, developed a large diameter percussion bit and curtain grouting, and mastered technological and engineering knowledge of bridge construction in complex terrains and the ocean.

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