Firth of Forth in Scotland - 1.5 km long cantilever

Until the Quebec bridge was opened in Canada, the Firth of Forth had the longest span in the world, 520 meters and 46 meters above the water.

In the late 1800s another Scottish Firth of Tay bridge collapsed under the influence of a strong wind, then 75 people were killed. It was the biggest disaster in the history of bridges. So when the architects proposed the construction of the Firth of Forth bridge, the people of Scotland demanded a structure that would be resistant to strong winds.

Firth of Forth might not have been a bridge, engineers were considering building a tunnel, but it would be too risky.

This bridge was one of the first large steel railway bridges.

54 thousand tons of steel were used to build the bridge, 177 m² granite, stone and concrete, 21 thousand tons of cement and almost 7 million rivets.

Three huge caissons, embedded under the river bed and filled with concrete, are the foundations of the tower. For spans exceeding 213 meters, the bridge designers were eager to use load-bearing elements with a tubular cross-section. The main elements of the three powerful towers are pipes. Some pipes are so big that there would be a train in them.