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As two more bodies were pulled out of the Mississippi River from the debris of Minneapolis' collapsed I-35 bridge, CBS had Sheila MacVicar offer the European perspective on her colleague Nancy Cordes' report last Friday that American inspectors rely on the naked eye to check for metal fatigue in highway bridges. Europe, MacVicar showed us, has "some of the most spectacular new bridges and some of the most beautiful old ones" and can keep an automated round-the-clock eye on its infrastructure. Fiber optic filament may either be glued onto bridges or embedded in concrete spans so that hairline fractures can be pinpointed precisely. The sensors are made by Smartec in Switzerland and by Lifespan in Atlanta--but are not deployed for American bridges, some of which "have a hard time even finding the money to buy paint."
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