A 900-year-old bridge in China doused to ashes on Saturday night, with China recording its biggest loss. The Wan’an bridge, the longest wooden arch bridge collapsed reporting a major loss in the history of the nation.
The ancient bridge was built in the Song Dynasty (960-1127) in Pingnan county in east China’s Fujian Province. Experts suspect that the incident was not a natural disaster and called for the enhancement of protection of ancient architecture as per reports.
An ancient architecture expert of Peking University, Xu Yitao said, “I speculate it was likely to be caused by man-made conduct and not a natural disaster, the spontaneous combustion of the bridge on the water is rare.”
Also known as the Bridge of Universal Peace, the bridge fire was doused in 10 hours but collapsed during the first 20 minutes of the fire. The 98.2 meters long bridge holds significant cultural value as it shows ancient Chinese mastered wisdom and ingenuities in wooden architecture designs, especially when the wooden arch bridge prototype in such a length was extremely difficult to manifest
The head of China Cultural Relics Academy and former curator of the Palace Museum, Shan Jixiang said, “Fire prevention is one of the important works needed for protecting ancient wooden architectures.”
However, no casualties were reported in the fire but the cause of the fire is still under investigation. The Criminal Investigation Department of the Pingnan County Public Security Bureau has stepped in for the case’s further inquiry.