Beyond The Invisible

Amazing, Interesting and Inspiring

Water Bridge Over River !



Hard to believe?

But you have to. The water bridge is in Germany. The 918 meters long bridge took six years and 500 million euros to complete.

It is a channel-bridge over the River Elbe and joins the former East and West Germany, as part of the unification project. It is located in the city of Magdeburg, near Berlin.

To those who appreciate engineering projects, here's a puzzle for you armchair engineers and physicists. Did that bridge have to be designed to withstand the additional weight of ship and barge traffic, or just the weight of the water?

Answer: It only needs to be designed to withstand the weight of the water! Why? A ship always displaces an amount of water that weighs the same as the ship,regardless of how heavily a ship may be loaded.

4 comments

  • Pep  
    6 July 2011 at 10:10 pm

    need mover information to answer question. normally your answer is correct, but it may not.

    is the water free to be displaced.

    if you put a fish in a bowl of water the fish displaces water
    but the weight of the fish is added to weight of the bowl and water.

  • BHAVIN  
    23 September 2011 at 7:35 pm

    the boats are lighter than the water they displace... obviously the weight of the boats wasn't an issue...

  • Anonymous  
    24 September 2011 at 8:48 pm

    the answer is correct only .. the displaced water will go to the other parts of river which is very long .. hence.. only wt of water needs to be considered ..

  • Md Shahbaz Khan  
    28 October 2011 at 5:10 pm

    In case of a bowl, the water displaced, remain within the bowl, bt in case of this bridge, the water which gets displeced, go out of bridge to the two conecting river which this bridge is a conector, so the wa8 remains constant.

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