On 14 August 2018, around 11:36 CEST (09:36 UTC) a section of the Ponte Morandi (English: Morandi Bridge) in Genoa, Liguria, Italy, collapsed during a rainstorm, killing forty-three people. The remains were demolished in June 2019. The replacement bridge, the Genoa-Saint George Bridge was inaugurated a year later.
The cable-stayed bridge was designed by civil engineer Riccardo Morandi, from whom its unofficial name was derived. The viaduct was built between 1963 and 1967 along the A10 motorway over the Polcevera River and officially opened on 4 September 1967.
On 14 August 2018, around 11:36 CEST (09:36 UTC), during a torrential rainstorm, a 210-meter (690 ft) section of Ponte Morandi collapsed. The collapsed span was centred on the westernmost cable-stayed pillar, pillar 9, and crossed the Polcevera, as well as an industrial area of Sampierdarena. Eyewitnesses reported that the bridge was hit by lightning before it collapsed. Between 30 and 35 cars and three trucks were reported to have fallen from the bridge.
A large part of the collapsed bridge and the vehicles on it fell into the rain-swollen Polcevera. Other parts landed on the tracks of the Turin–Genoa and Milan–Genoa railways, and on warehouses belonging to Ansaldo Energia, an Italian power engineering company. The latter were largely empty because the collapse occurred on the eve of a major Italian public holiday, Ferragosto.
The initial hypotheses were that a structural weakness or a landslide caused the collapse. The bridge was reportedly undergoing maintenance at the time of the collapse, including strengthening the road foundations.
The southern stays reportedly gave way explosively due to corrosion and damage. With only four stays, one of them giving way might have been enough for the structure to lose stability. A preliminary investigative report suggested the pillar itself may have collapsed first, but Genoa prosecutors had not provided the report's authors with a local video showing the southern stays gave way first. There is speculation that lightning may have struck the stays, or a landslide could have destabilised the base.
In July 2019, a video showing the fall of the bridge was made public. It originated from the nearby Ferrometal company cameras, showing that both southern stays and locally attached road sections at pillar 9 started dropping virtually simultaneously. From the movement of the top crossbeam, the tension cables of the southeastern stay apparently gave way. Immediately, the complete road on the pillar and soon after also the pillar itself fell. However, Autostrade, the company that maintained the bridge, objected that the video still does not show all bridge structures, so it does not really explain the cause.
At the time of the collapse, the bridge was managed by Atlantia S.p.A. (formerly Autostrade S.p.A.), a holding company operating toll motorways and airports, which is controlled by the Benetton family. The family waited two days to release a company public statement offering condolences to victims and their families.
The disaster caused a major political controversy about the poor state of infrastructure in Italy and raised wider questions about the condition of bridges across Europe.
According to the Corriere della Sera, this was the 11th bridge collapse in Italy since 2013.
It was later decided that the bridge would not be repaired, but demolished. Demolition began in February 2019 and was completed on 28 June 2019.
Forty-three people were confirmed dead and 16 injured. The victims included 29 Italian citizens, four French citizens, three Chilean citizens, two Albanian citizens, and one citizen each from Colombia, Jamaica, Moldova, Peru, and Romania.
Survivors were transported to nearby hospitals, many in critical condition. Davide Capello, the former goalkeeper for Cagliari, survived without injury and was able to walk away from his car, even though it had dropped 30 metres (100 ft) before becoming wedged between parts of the fallen bridge.
The area under the remaining part of the bridge, including several homes, was evacuated. As of 02:00 the following day (midnight UTC), 12 people were known still to be missing, and voices could be heard calling from underneath the debris; rescue efforts were continuing by floodlight using techniques commonly deployed after earthquakes. The number of known dead grew to 43 as of four days after the event.
The railways connecting Genoa Sampierdarena (and Genoa Piazza Principe) with Genoa Borzoli and Genoa Rivarolo were closed immediately as a result of the bridge's collapse. A rail replacement bus service was established between the stations.
The day after the collapse, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte declared a state of emergency for the Liguria region, which would last for a year. According to deputy minister of infrastructure Edoardo Rixi, the entire bridge would be demolished.
The Italian Football Federation announced that a minute of silence would be held for the victims of the collapse before all football events across the country during the weekend that followed the incident. On 16 August, the Lega Serie A postponed the opening 2018–19 Serie A matches for both Genoese association football clubs Genoa and Sampdoria that were originally scheduled for 19 August.
Italian transport minister Danilo Toninelli, who had started in office on 1 June 2018, described the incident as "an immense tragedy", but it was pointed out that his Five Star Movement political party had said in 2012 that the risk of a collapse of Morandi Bridge was just a silly fairy tale, because "the bridge would have lasted another hundred years", quoting a 2009 evaluation by Autostrade.