Indians almost destroyed the bridge with spitting (7 photos)

They spit! But you and I couldn’t destroy the bridge even if we spat twice as hard. Only Indians can do this. And that's why.





It's a pity the bridge

The bridge over the Hooghly River in Kolkata has rusted at the base of the pile and is now in a state of disrepair. But it was built conscientiously under British rule in 1943.

This is not yet a critical age for the bridge, if it weren’t for the constant spitting of passers-by and people passing by. This is because Indians have more than just saliva; a good half of them chew paan.



Chewed betel until his gums turned red and laughed

Paan is essentially betel leaves, which turns your teeth and gums an eerie red, plus mixed with its nuts.

Betel nut saliva is particularly caustic; it was able to corrode the steel bridge support by 3mm. Add to this the daily bird droppings on the damaged areas, and it turns out that the material of the supports has become twice as thin!





This is what each pile looks like, and it's rust, not betel nut red

How they are trying to save the bridge

Additional city employees were hired. Their only job is to walk across the bridge every morning and evening and clean off all this “stuff.” Because it is not yet possible to force people who have chewed betel nut not to spit.

This happens automatically, and almost half of the country’s population chews betel nut. It is impossible to retrain a billion, I had to hire two people to correct their damage. But since the days are hot, everything spat on from morning to evening still manages to cause its harm.



This is what Howrah Bridge looks like from the other side, the railings are also all red and rusty

Every day, more than 150 thousand pedestrians and 10 thousand cars pass through the bridge, so allowing repairs in such heavy traffic means causing a real transport collapse. The city simply cannot handle this.



This is what it looks like in travel brochures

They are thinking of covering the completely crumbled areas with sheets of plastic or simply protective advertising banners. You don’t feel sorry for them, but they won’t last long under betel attack.

On the other hand, sooner or later the bridge will be closed as an emergency bridge. The supports have already been thinned by half; local authorities are simply turning a blind eye to the problem.



It’s two to one - the cables are old and the overload is constant

Well, or it will come to another catastrophe with a collapse. In India they occur quite often, especially in the provinces where suspension bridges are hung. People are exceeding traffic limits.

When the cables of a bridge on the Matchhu River broke, about 500 people fell into the water (141 died). At the time it was built with a capacity of 200.

The population is growing, and the entire infrastructure is completely unable to keep up with the pace of reconstruction. Just remember the push on trains!



People crowd because they simply have no other way to the other side

I can’t even think of what popular habit could cause some kind of collapse or collapse in us, we are not so homogeneous. Hindus have such a unifying feature - betel.