Cracks in tunnel construction await further inspection
22-AUG-2008 Intellasia | Saigon Times Daily page 1
Aug 22, 2008 - 7:00:00 AM
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Cracks that developed in the tunnel sections as part of the East-West Highway crossing the Saigon River are technical defects, which will be further inspected to see if they will impact on the quality of the project, said a senior construction official.
Luu Quang Hung, head of the State Inspection Committee for Construction Projects, told reporters at a press briefing in Hanoi on Tuesday that parties involved in this project should take caution in appraising the situation to see if such cracks would affect the overall structure.
Japan's Obayashi Corp as the contractor has suggested solutions to mend the defects, but it is the HCM City government as the project owner should have the final say on the solutions, Hung said.
Under a proposal submitted by the contractor to the Ministry of Construction, those cracks with a width of between 0.1 mm and 0.3 mm will be repaired by applying a special glue, while smaller fissures need no fixing.
Obayashi in its proposal also reported that most of the cracks are minor ones, and the biggest crack has a width of between 0.2 mm and 0.3 mm stretching some two metres.
Asked for comments on the possible reasons behind the fissures, Hung said the reasons had not been identified. However, he rejected the possibility of fraud in using materials.
He said the responsibility now rests with the four parties involved, namely the HCM City government as the project owner, the contractor, the supervision consultant Pacific Consultants International (PCI), and the project management unit.
Hung however downplayed the seriousness of the situation, saying "all are under control" as the project was regularly inspected by the State Appraisal Committee for Construction Projects.
The Thu Thiem Tunnel, part of the East-West Highway linking District 1 in downtown HCM City with District 2 in the Thu Thiem Peninsula, is 1.5 kilometres long, including a 370-metre tunnel section running under the Saigon River.
Four tunnel sections, each measuring nine metres high, 33 metres wide and 92 metres long, are being constructed in Dong Nai Province, and completion of these sections is scheduled for next month.
In a report to the State Inspection Committee for Construction Projects on July 31, the management unit of the East-West Highway project said the cracks needed repairing before the sections can be brought to HCM City, according to Thanh Nien.
Inspectors said the cracks had absorbed rainwater, which would weaken the loading capacity and stability of the whole tunnel structure.
India's BHEL enters Vietnam for US$50m hydropower project
22/Aug/2008 Intellasia | Market Wire
Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas) --Indian power equipment major Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BOM: 500103) (BHEL) (Mumbai) recently forayed into Vietnam with a US$50 million contract to construct a 200-megawatt ( MW) hydroelectric power plant in the country. The contract will be funded through the line of credit of US$45 million extended in January this year by the Indian government to its Vietnamese counterpart. The funds will be administered by the Export Import Bank of India (Mumbai).
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Rach Mieu Bridge joins spans today
22/Aug/2008 Intellasia | Thanhniennews
A long-awaited bridge linking Tien Giang and Ben Tre provinces in the Mekong Delta will today join its middle spans, one of the final steps ahead of the project completion next month.
The Rach Mieu Suspension Bridge, which has been under construction since 2002, is the country's first Vietnamese-designed and executed cable bridge.
The 1.4 trillion dong (US$84 million) structure, crossing the Tien River, measures 2,878 metres in length and 12 metres in width.
The four-lane bridge is expected to open to traffic in late September. It has a clearance of 37 metres for waterway traffic.
58% of the build-operate-transfer (BOT) project was financed from the government budget and 42% from the Ministry of Transportation's Civil Construction Engineering Corp (Cienco) 1, Cienco No.5 and Cienco No.6.
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