Puente Mercosur – Truss Girder Bridge across the Orinoco

With the aim of developing the Southwest of Venezuela and enable its connections with the rest of the country, a third bridge over the Orinoco River was designed between the cities of Cabruta, State of Guárico in the north and Caicara del Orinoco in the south.

The combined highway and railroad bridge Puente Mercosur will be the third crossing of the Orinoco with a total length of 11.125 km. The stay-cable main bridge with 360m main span and the adjacent approach bridges with a length of 2 x 720m are comprised of a steel composite truss girder with a depth of 12.0m. The pylons and piers are founded on piles with a diameter of 2.50m resp.

2.00m and a length of up to 80m.

The deck for the approach viaducts and the side spans of the main bridge is assembled in construction yards adjacent to the southern and northern abutments, before launching each into its final position using Teflon plates on top of the piers, and lifting devices at the front and end of the sections to compensate deformations of the superstructure during launching. The centre segment of the main bridge with a length of 120 m and a dead weight of 2400 ton will be lifted from a barge. A non linear time history analysis has been performed for the earthquake design of the shock transmitter bars in the approach viaducts.