After a tow carrying a few rock barges collided with a pier on Union Pacific Railroad’s (UPRR) bridge 610.49 along the Atchafalaya River, the rail bridge was shut down and an emergency design and construction team (Modjeski & Masters and Massman Construction Co.) was called in to perform emergency repairs.

The barge collided with the upstream pier and caused it to shift 16 inches to the west and seven inches to the south of its original orientation.

The pier affected consisted of two concrete-filled, 16-foot-diameter shafts with four I-Girders spanning between them for the truss to sit on. The repair solution consisted of driving four steel pipe piles to laterally support the pier.

The four, 48-inch diameter, with ¾-inch wall pile were driven opposite the navigation channel and are spaced at 20-degree angles around the west side of the pier. The piles were filled with concrete and connected to the existing pier using wedge beams for additional piling support.