The official portal of the city of Kerch published unique photographs of the construction of a bridge to Crimea. Footage of the arch of the Kerch bridge has been published, the structure is amazing in size “The ascent took place as usual”
The photographs were taken by one of the construction participants. It shows that the arch of the future crossing is already rising above the construction site. The huge metal structure amazes with the size and scale of the work done.
70% of the navigation arches of the Crimean Bridge have already been installed on the Kerch side, said Leonid Ryzhenkin, Deputy General Director for Infrastructure Projects of Stroygazmontazh LLC.
“The navigable arches of the Crimean Bridge are now being assembled on the Kerch side on slipways. More than 7,000 tons of metal structures have already been installed. This is 70% of the total volume,” Ryzhenkin said.
The railway arch weighs almost six thousand tons, and the automobile arch weighs four thousand tons, each length is more than 200 m. These are the largest structures of the Crimean Bridge. Roll-out piers are also being built there, along which the structures will be lowered to the water and moved to pontoons. Work to enlarge the spans is carried out around the clock. More than 500 people are involved in them.
Let us recall that in early April, the head of the Ministry of Transport, Maxim Sokolov, reported to Russian President Vladimir Putin that the bridge across the Kerch Strait was being built ahead of schedule. The minister noted that more than half of the piles have already been driven and stated that “the equator has already been crossed along the Crimean Bridge.” It was also added that this is a truly important strategic object of Russia, on which efforts were concentrated to the maximum.
The bridge that will connect Crimea and Krasnodar region, will pass between the Kerch and Taman peninsulas, through the island of Tuzla. According to the plan, road traffic will be launched in 2018, and rail traffic in 2019. This will not only be the longest bridge in Russia, but also in Europe; in its finished form, its length will be 19 km, and it will “bypass” the currently leading Portuguese road bridge Vasco da Gama, whose length is 17.2 kilometers.
Proof of this is the current operation to install a road arched span, which has no equal in the world - a multi-ton metal structure 227 meters long is brought in from the sea to be installed on fairway supports at a height of 35 meters. This cannot be called anything other than a miracle of technology. The idea of building a crossing across the Kerch Strait has existed since time immemorial, probably even when Prince Potemkin annexed Crimea to Russia in 1783. But communication with the peninsula in this direction for a long time was only by ferry and shipping. Military sappers built a ferry crossing here at the end of the Great Patriotic War, after the liberation of Crimea from Nazi troops.
But in 1945, the pontoon bridge was destroyed by the movement of ice that moved from the Azov Sea. The design itself, intended for short river crossings, turned out to be unsuitable for sea conditions. It was decided to dismantle the building completely and design the construction of a new, more reliable structure.
However, neither in 1949 nor in 1991 did the developed and even approved projects for the construction of a bridge in the Kerch Bay ever receive their actual implementation. The complexity of the technical execution of the projects (and there were several of them) and the lack of such large-scale funding also had an impact. We were content with land communications, road and rail, through the territory of the then Ukrainian SSR, present-day Ukraine - there were no problems on its part then.
The topic of building a bridge in the Kerch Strait was returned to in 2003, when Ukraine was already enjoying its “independence” to the fullest and considered Crimea its “native” territory. Due to Russia's intention to build an artificial dam to the island of Tuzla, a serious conflict arose with official Kiev. There were still more than ten long years left before the return of Crimea, and the scandalous situation hushed up on its own. But even then it became clear that the historical identity of the peninsula would sooner or later be restored. Which, in fact, happened as a result of the popular referendum in 2014. And after just three years, Crimea had the opportunity to receive reliable communications with the mainland.
“We couldn’t decide how to build a bridge across the Kerch Strait for quite some time,” says the expert, former official representative railway troops Russia Alexander Komarov. - Several projects were envisaged where the length mattered, because a kilometer of highway on land and over the sea area have significant differences, including in cost. The following projects were proposed as the main construction options. “Northern” - from Cape Lantern to Maly Kut. The length of the structure would be at least 10 kilometers, while the railway line would have to be pulled for 24 kilometers, and the road line twice as long. The Zhukovsky route could connect Zhukovka and the Chushka spit - there are only 6 kilometers, but the access roads of all types of transport are very long. The “Yenikalsky” project envisaged stretching from Cape Yenikalino to the Chushka Spit, but even here, with a relatively short distance, everything rested on long access roads. The “Tuzla” direction was seen from Cape Ak-Burun to the island itself - also a very long way. But it was he who became decisive in choosing the site for the construction of the bridge. There are a number of circumstances that made it possible to choose this direction. The new bridge here will not interfere with the existing ferry crossing through the ports of Kavkaz and Crimea. Again, there are opportunities for further development, including through areas for placement of construction materials. There are opportunities to further ensure the operation of the new bridge. Figuratively speaking, trackmen also need to be based somewhere, and preferably in close proximity to the road.”
How to build Crimean Bridge through the Kerch Strait is already clear, and the installation of the arched car arch is almost live and this can be seen on TV news, including on the Zvezda TV channel. Let's take a brief look, or rather remember, some of the characteristics of this unique design. The total length of the bridge across the Kerch Strait will be 19 kilometers. Its construction began simultaneously from 8 points. The length of the sea sections from the Tuzla Spit to the Tuzla Island (6.5 kilometers of land there) and from the island to Kerch will be 13 kilometers. About 600 supports and more than 5.5 thousand piles of different sizes are used to build the bridge.
“It is impossible for a non-professional to visually assess the scale of such construction; the picture in TV clips cannot convey the full complexity of the tasks performed by bridge builders,” continues Alexander Komarov. “This is not just a huge amount of work, but also the technical genius of our engineers, the uniqueness of the equipment, including the six-hundred-ton jacks that are now involved in installing the arch of the automobile span. It is no coincidence that the Crimean Bridge is already called the “eighth wonder of the world” and there is no exaggeration here. But if the construction of the Tower of Babel, a failed miracle of architectural thought, led to a misunderstanding of people speaking different languages, which prevented the construction of a “tower to heaven,” then the bridge across the Kerch Strait, on the contrary, becomes a symbol of unity and friendliness between people.”
The Crimean bridge across the Kerch Strait promises to become the longest in Europe. Now the most long bridges in Russia are located in St. Petersburg - the Southern overpass of the Western High-Speed Diameter, which is a two-story bridge across the Sea Canal and a cable-stayed bridge across the Korabelny fairway (9378 meters), as well as the Northern overpass (8794 meters).
In the world practice of bridge construction, China holds the lead, where the Danyang-Kunshan Viaduct is located, railroad bridge, which is part of the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway, 164 kilometers long. The Qingdao Bridge across Jiaozhou Bay was also built there, the length of which is 42.5 kilometers. There are long bridges in the USA, Egypt, and Japan.
With its more “modest” 19 kilometers, the Crimean Bridge amazes not with its length, but with the uniqueness of technical technologies, in which one of the main ones is the construction of arched spans at high altitudes. After all, the Kerch Strait connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Azov and there is active shipping there, including large-tonnage dry cargo ships and cruise ships, which will easily fit under the new bridge. And it really has no analogues in the world.
An operation to install the railway arch of the Crimean Bridge is underway in the Kerch Strait
According to experts, the process of raising the arch onto the supports will take about 7 hours. As soon as the structure is in place, the Kerch Strait will reopen to shipping.
And now there is a traffic jam in the Kerch Strait.
The first day of a naval operation (time lapse)
Operation start video
Starting an operation from a copter
Docking of the first tug
Graphics of installation and transportation of the railway arch of the Crimean Bridge
positioning the arch between supports
Transportation of the arch, night, VIDEO
Transporting the arch to the fairway, from a copter, night
The first stage of the maritime operation for the transportation and installation of the arches of the Crimean Bridge is underway in the Kerch Strait: a railway arch span weighing more than 6 thousand tons was delivered to the builders, and now they are preparing to lift it onto the fairway supports. More than a hundred specialists are involved in this most complex technological operation - sailors, specialized engineers, employees of research institutes and ordinary bridge builders.
“The maritime operation in the Crimean Bridge project is, without exaggeration, unique for bridge construction: it is transportation, and then lifting and installation in a sea area with an unstable hydrometeorological background of an arched structure whose weight exceeds 6 thousand tons. However, such an operation would have been impossible without the enormous experience accumulated by bridge workers in other projects. So our maritime operation is the result of many years of practice and advanced technologies of domestic and global bridge construction,” said Leonid Ryzhenkin, Deputy General Director for Infrastructure Projects of STROYGAZMONTAZH LLC. 
Installing an arched span into the design position consists of several key steps. Before each start, the Quality Control Services, designer's supervision and construction control carry out an inspection of the work already completed: they check them for compliance with the technical documentation and confirm with the appropriate acceptance certificate.
On the eve of going to sea, the builders prepared the arch for loading onto floating supports. Two floating piers were installed under it, and, having received confirmation of a favorable weather forecast for the next three days, the builders loaded the arched span onto them. On the night of August 28, the floating system began its 5-kilometer journey from the Kerch shore to the bridge site. More than 10 tugs, boats and other vessels took part in this part of the operation - the direct sea part. The team of the operation itself is more than 100 people.
Early in the morning of August 28, the sailors brought the floating system into the alignment between the fairway supports with a maximum gap of up to 65 cm and secured it with anchor cables. At this point, the lifting equipment on the supports is completely ready: lifting units, working platforms, devices (cable jacks, pumping stations, and so on).
At both edges of the arched span, “strands” of high-strength cables are secured, stretched to the arch from 16 jacks installed on top of the fairway supports. Each of the “strands” contains more than 40 cables, that is, the arch will be raised to a height using almost 700 cables. The lifting capacity of each jack is 650 tons, so, despite the weight of the arch being 6,000 tons, the builders provided a 40 percent reserve for lifting mechanisms.
During the day, the arch will begin to rise to its design height at an average speed of 5 meters per hour. By the time this operation is completed, the maximum permissible deviations of the structure along the bridge axis will not exceed 60 mm, and across the bridge axis - 30 mm. Then the arch will be secured with wind ties to the crossbars of the fairway supports.
In total, the installation of a railway arch on the fairway will not exceed 72 hours. At this time, navigation in the Kerch-Yenikalsky Canal is limited. As soon as the builders confirm the reliability of fixing the arched span at the designed height, navigation of ships along the fairway will resume as usual.
The final installation of the railway arch on the fairway supports will require about another month. Construction and installation work will be carried out from working platforms installed on fairway supports and will not affect navigation in the Kerch-Yenikalsky Canal.
The second stage of the naval operation - the installation of the road arch of the Crimean Bridge - is scheduled for September. 
Reference
The length of the navigable span of the Crimean Bridge is 227 meters, the total weight of the structures of both arches is about 11 thousand tons. The under-bridge clearance, 185 meters wide and 35 meters high, ensures unhindered passage of all ships plying through the Kerch-Yenikalsky Canal.
A railway arch is a combination of a span with through main trusses and an arch. The trains move along the elements of the truss, while the arch, in conditions of such a long span, performs a supporting function. The truss and arch elements are connected by pendants.
A floating system is floating supports with an arched span submerged and fixed to them. It is based on pontoons, united like a catamaran and equipped with specialized deck equipment.
SIMFEROPOL, August 29 – RIA Novosti, Maxim Groznov. The railway arch of the bridge under construction across the Kerch Strait weighing 6 thousand tons is fixed on fairway supports at an altitude of 35 meters above the water level, the Crimean Bridge information center reported.
The operation to install the railway arch span of the bridge across the Kerch Strait began on Sunday morning, and shipping traffic in the strait was suspended for 72 hours. The arched span, 227 meters long and 45 meters high, was transported using floaters to the fairway supports. Lifting of the arch using powerful jacks began late on Monday evening and was successfully completed on Tuesday morning.
“The railway arch of the Crimean Bridge has been lifted onto the fairway supports and securely fixed at the design height of 35 meters from the water. The ship and aeronautical alarm system is already operating on the structure. Final installation on the fairway supports will take another three weeks,” the message says.
“The production of the arch, its assembly on slipways over the course of a year, the manufacture of the floating systems on which it was loaded, the fastening of the arch on powerful fairway supports: all together - this is a unique operation. We gathered the best specialists who were able to do this, and we are very grateful to them for this,” the information center quotes the words of the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Stroygazmontazh LLC Arkady Rotenberg.
© Info center "Crimean Bridge"
© Info center "Crimean Bridge"
The floating supports, with the help of which the arch was towed, returned to the Kerch shore for inspection and re-equipment. After carrying out the necessary procedures, a road arch weighing 5 thousand tons will be transported and installed. As a result, two arched spans will rise above the fairway, under which ships will pass unhindered, the Crimean Bridge information center noted.
The bridge across the Kerch Strait, which will connect Crimea and the Krasnodar Territory, will be the longest in Russia - its length will be 19 kilometers. The start of vehicle traffic on the bridge is scheduled for December 2018.