Vasco da Gama Bridge - Definition and Overview

The Vasco da Gama crossing which spans for 17,185m is one of the largest of its kind in the world. The bridge itself is a continuous viaduct of 12,300 m long and 30 m wide. It is still the longest in Europe. It crosses the estuary of the Tagus river in its wide part, at the North end of the city of Lisbon, Portugal.

• It has been designed for an earthquake 4.5 times stronger than the historical 1755 Lisbon earthquake (estimated at 8.7 on Richter scale).
• It is able to withstand wind speeds of 250 km/h.
• Deepest foundation piles 2.2 m and 1.7 m diameter have been driven down to minus 85m under mean sea level.
• The design life expected is 120 years.
• Due to bridge length it has been necessary to take into account the earth's curvature to locate correctly the piers (otherwise a mistake of 80 cm would have appeared at the bridge's end).
• The main span is a cable-stayed bridge.

Work began in 1995 and the bridge was opened to traffic on March 29, 1998, just before the Expo 98 World's Fair, 500 years after navigator Vasco da Gama's discovery of the sea route from Europe to India.