Check out the incredible 3.5-kilometer overpass demolition

You may have seen the demolition of various structures here, but the explosion you'll see in the following video is especially interesting. This is because, in addition to being a viaduct over 3.5 kilometers long, the responsible engineers had to take a lot of care, as it is in a densely populated area. You can enable subtitles in Portuguese in the menu:

According to The Atlantic Cities, the Zhuan-yang viaduct, located in Wuhan, China, which had been built 16 years ago and had two lanes, was demolished to make way for a new, more modern and larger structure, with six lanes of traffic. However, under such a viaduct pass several gas distribution stations and, as you can imagine, gases and explosives are a very dangerous combination.

In addition, power lines run along the bridge, not to mention that a badly planned explosion could seriously damage the numerous homes and buildings surrounding the viaduct. Another issue, of course, was the possible injuries that pieces of concrete could cause if they flew in through the windows.

Dust under the carpet

To prevent collateral damage - in what has become the largest demolition project ever carried out in China - engineers covered the entire surface of the viaduct with a kind of carpet, which was fastened with wires and numerous sandbags and water pockets to prevent let him fly through the sky during the explosion.

Thus, by using this mat, the team prevented concrete pieces from hitting nearby structures, while sandbags and water pockets prevented dust from spreading everywhere. And if you're curious about how long it took for the viaduct to be demolished, all this work was done in less than half a minute!