From 2 hours to 2 minutes: China unveils world's tallest bridge in Guizhou

China's Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge, the world's tallest at 625 metres, opens to traffic, cutting a two-hour canyon journey to just two minutes for travellers

China has officially opened the Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge, the world’s tallest bridge, transforming travel in the mountainous Guizhou province. Rising 625 metres above the Beipan River, the suspension bridge cuts travel time across the canyon from two hours to just two minutes. 

Dubbed the ‘Earth’s crack’ for its deep and narrow gorge, the Huajiang Grand Canyon now hosts a bridge that surpasses all previous engineering feats. The new structure is about the same height as the Shanghai Tower, China’s tallest skyscraper, and around 60 metres higher than the Duge Bridge, the former record holder located 200 km away, South China Morning Post reported. 

Spanning 2,890 metres in total length, it is also set to become the longest mountain bridge in the world. Its 1,420-metre main span is even longer than Britain’s Humber Bridge, once the world’s longest single-span suspension bridge. 

In a post X, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said, “Rising 625 metres above the river and set to be the world’s tallest, the Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge in Guizhou, SW China, unveiled a spectacular water curtain test, where sunlight and spray merged to paint a rainbow over the canyon.” 

  Three years of construction

The bridge took three years to build and was assembled from 93 steel truss sections weighing 22,000 tonnes – roughly three times the weight of the Eiffel Tower, according to China’s Science and Technology Daily. 

The project also made use of advanced construction methods, including Doppler lidar detection, BeiDou dynamic positioning, digital assembly and intelligent transport technologies, which significantly reduced the building time.   

 

A hub of world-class bridges

Guizhou already hosts nearly half of the world’s 100 tallest bridges. The Beipan River alone is crossed by multiple record-breaking structures, including the Duge Bridge (2016) and the Beipanjiang Guanxing Bridge (2003). 

Of the 50 tallest bridges in the world today, only three stand outside China, the news report said.