Costly repairs ahead after driver strikes bridge

The collision knocked three full sections of the guardrail down, including all 10 of the granite decorative columns included in each section of the railing.

Bernadette Chamberlain, with Sky High Crane, said the plan is to start work at 6 a.m. today. She said it will likely take about five to eight hours of work to hoist all the material out of Bridgewater Channel.

Once Lake Havasu City has recovered the pieces, it will be able to determine what can be salvaged, and what needs to be replaced.

City Manager Jess Knudson said work to repair the London Bridge, technically the largest antique ever sold, will not be cheap.

“It is not something that you can buy off the shelf,” he said. “We will have to find a company that is going to allow us to customize build the replacement. It is a specialized market. So we will do our best to find the right use of taxpayer dollars, but it is going to be important for us to do quality work. We will certainly shop around and get different bids, but the deciding factor won’t be solely based on cost – it will be cost and quality.”

Knudson said it will likely take several months to repair the bridge. He said the north sidewalk on the bridge is expected to stay closed for the foreseeable future, but the sidewalk on the south side of the bridge will remain open to pedestrians.

According to police, the driver of the truck was Adam N. Carpenter, 24, who was arrested at the scene with a BAC between .15-.20.

Carpenter was arraigned in Lake Havasu City Justice Court on July 4 and was released on his own recognizance. Nashell Leydekkers with the Justice Court said the court is waiting on the County Attorney for charges. Carpenter’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for Aug. 7 at 9 a.m.

Carpenter has also been issued a civil traffic ticket in the Lake Havasu City Municipal Court for failure to drive on the right side of the road. He is scheduled to be arraigned on that charge on Sept. 9.

It’s not the first time Lake Havasu City has been faced with such repairs. This is the fourth time a vehicle has hit the guard rail on London Bridge since it was relocated to Lake Havasu City in 1967.

The last time it happened was in December 2014. In that instance, about 40 feet of railing was dislodged, according to an article in Today’s News-Herald at the time. In that instance, Prescott-based Technology Construction was hired to do the repair work with an estimated price tag of $146,000. After the accident near the end of 2014, the repairs were started in March 2015 and completed in April.