HWY 277 was closed when a 160,000 pound, 190 ft. long railroad bridge support, manufactured in Little Rock and being transported to Brownsville, TX fell off of it’s tansport Thursday night, around 7:30.
Early Friday morning, heavy duty wreckers were brought to the scene, but weren’t able lift the huge piece of metal.
Work continued Friday to figure out how to get the 16 ft. high load back onto the trucking dollies, and 2 construction cranes were brought in from Monroe, LA, which arrived Saturday.
The cranes were able to lift the bridge support, and, Sunday morning, it was chained back into place on the dollies, prepared for it’s trip to Texas, on Monday.
According to Drew County Sherrif Mark Gober, who was at the scene until the roadway was open, Monday around 1 pm, the convoy began slowly moving westwest, and was able to travel approximately 1/4 mile, before encountering another curve/hill combination, which again flipped the bridge support over onto the 2-lane highway, again closing the road.
With more damage being done to the piece of steel, and closing the state highway for several more day not being a viable option; a timber clearing dozer was brought in to push the huge object into the road ditch, to be dealt with later.
The road was re-opened to traffic around 9:30 pm.