Inspection & quality control measures

( Quality assurance plan)

NATURE OF WORK : BRIDGES & FLYOVERS

Kumbh Mela 2025 : Prayagraj Mela Authority, Prayagraj, Uttarpradesh

Quality Control Measures in Highway Bridge
Construction
Highway bridge engineering is an important part of modern transportation system.
It has a great effect on the development of modern society. Therefore, it is very
important to ensure the construction quality of highway bridge engineering. At
present, there are many construction technology & quality control issues in the
construction of highway bridges which should be given enough attention
Significance of quality control of the road
bridge construction

• Highway bridge construction and other construction works have a big differences in the
construction methodology .
• Highway bridge construction technology has a certain degree of particularity.
• It has a targeted construction methodology . If the methodology has a problem, then the
quality of the entire highway bridge is difficult to be guaranteed.
• Before the start of the construction works, the project construction staffs need to have
thorough understanding on the entire construction technology to ensure that their
implementation of the construction process meets the construction specific needs. It is
the only way to ensure the overall quality of highway bridge construction.
Reasons of emergence of highway bridge quality
problems
 Reason-1
Employer aspects of the problem :

• The quality of the project should first come from the Employer, mainly as follows:
• Individual leadership quality awareness is weak,
• Poor measures on inspection and guidance work in the form of project
management
• Lack of technical force investment
• Violation of construction procedures
• Bidding system is not perfect.
• In addition, it can be due to the not standardized operation, lack of engineering
supervision system, supervision work problems, lack of relevant functional
departments, violation of laws and regulations, illegal subcontracting, and
subcontracting projects
Reason-2

Problems of construction
• Rushing of the construction unit results in the construction not being
executed in accordance with the rules, norms and design requirements
of the construction. In order to maximize the pursuit of profits, there
might use of substandard materials to reduce the cost and employ large
number of low-quality construction workers in order to reduce labor cost
Highway bridge construction quality management
 Step-1 : Drawing Review
Construction drawing design should be reasonable since it determines the
efficiency & quality of the construction work. Hence, we must audit the
drawings to ensure the construction of high operability before issuance.
• Design units should be co-related with the construction site geological
survey report, geotechnical report combined with the previous design
experience, and study the construction links to ensure the rationality of
the design parameters.
• The Engineer-in-Charge should present the problems & discrepancies in
the drawings after due examination on account of mismatch between
the drawings and the construction site conditions at the paper
examination meeting.
• The drawing should be duly vetted for structural feasibly from reputed
organization's / consultants.
• Any changes / deviations from the actual drawing & design should be
mandatorily recorded & vetted by the reputed organization's /
\
consultants.
 Step-2 : Material management

• Building materials is the basis of construction, if its performance and

quality do not meet the requirements of the construction, the quality
of the project will be reduced. Therefore, as the source of project
quality control, we should focus on strengthening the quality of the
material management by generating a Quality Assurance plan.
• Strengthen the management of material suppliers.
• At the same time, construction units should strictly prevent
unqualified / non-confirming materials.
• Unqualified material suppliers should be black-listed for material
procurement.
 Step-3 : Material Quality Control
• Field & lab testing of the material & executed works as per the
mandatory requirement & frequency as per the relevant Codal
provisions to be made mandatory in the contractual agreement.
• The control of the key materials includes production
certificate,technical data sheet ,factory certificate and pre-dispatch
inspections. Product certification/ MTC must be checked and recorded
in the factory inspection report. If an indicator failed, it shall not be
used for construction
• The supervision engineer should strictly supervise the construction
unit in accordance with the requirements of the norms of inspection.
• Check on storage & use of steel & cement and other key construction
material.
• Mandatory submission of steel & cement register along with
reconciliation statement at fixed periodic intervals.
Step-4 : Construction Supervision

• Highway bridge construction environment is complex. In order to

minimize the impact of various factors on the quality of
construction, we must do the construction process supervision,
improve the construction of normative behavior, reduce or even
avoid illegal operations.
• Construction technology and supervision personnel should take a
strong on-site supervision and control measures, especially in the
key aspects of the construction process, key processes, key control
and supervision, and follow the process of controlling the
construction activities
• Timely detection of quality problems and correct, as far as
possible, so that the entire construction process can be effectively
controlled.
Highway bridge construction quality control
strategies
Best Practise-1 : Define and Share the Acceptance
Criteria
The first step is to define the definition of “done.” It’s important to ensure that
superintendents, crews, and subcontractors are on the same page about what does and does
not qualify as an acceptable result. When all the project participants understand what the
goal is, they are better able to get it right the first time. The quality management system
must be easy to follow and understand by every team member involved.
Some of the standards that might be incorporated into the acceptance criteria include:
No visible defects
Complies with minimum code standards
Meets all manufacturers’ specifications
Conforms to the customer’s contract specifications
Specific organizational preferences Solution :

Project-specific quality standards • Emphasis on clarity on acceptance criteria in

contract agreement.
• Clarity of acceptance criteria in Work manual
Industry common practices of the Implementation agency.
• Concurrent inspection of works : Day to Day,
Periodic, Squad.
• Deployment of competent supervisory team

• Training & capacity building of engineering

staff through scheduled workshops.
 Best Practise-2 : Create an Inspection Plan

• The inspection process allows you to determine whether a specific task was
completed as per the specifications. It’s how you know you have met the
acceptance criteria that were defined in the first step.
• The team needs to know what will be inspected, when inspections will happen,
and who is responsible for doing them.
• In some cases, this might be third-party inspectors.
• The construction process requires dozens or even hundreds of inspections.
Creating a plan allows you determine all the necessary inspections and to
confirm that they have been completed through a record of acceptance.
• Without this plan, you might assume that a lot of inspections were done, but
you won’t necessarily know which ones were not completed.

Solution : Generate & implement QAP. The Quality Assurance Plan is meant to guide
the project team during the process of creating a product while also helping the team
monitor, assess, and report on its quality. It also includes the schedule & frequency of
inspection as per the critical activity's schedules in the work program.
Best Practise-3 : Use Checklists to Conduct Inspections

• Quality inspection checklists can help you stay organized and ensure that all critical
items are verified. However, not all checklists are equally effective, and they are not
always properly used.
• Checklists should be shared with the team before the project starts and prior to each
work task to communicate critical requirements
• A checklist can essentially be used as an agenda for pre-task conversations so you can
communicate what areas warrant heightened awareness.
• The inspection process for a task concludes when all acceptance criteria have been
met and all elements of a checklist, including high-risk items, have received sign-off.

Solution :
• Follow & implement QAP.
• Mandatory kick-off meetings comprising technical discussion with the executing agency
• Training & capacity building of engineering staff through scheduled workshops.
• Weekly review meeting .
Best Practise-4 : Correct Deficiencies and Verify
Acceptance Criteria

When deficiencies have been identified through the inspection process,

subs and crews must correct them. The process is to:
•Physically mark the issue or area to prevent coverup
•Take a picture to clearly identify the issue and show how it’s marked in
the field
•Correct the issue
•Document the correction

Solution : Raise NCR. A Non-Conformance Report (also known as a Non-Conformity

Report or NCR) is a document that identifies and reports any discrepancies between the
actual condition of a product, service or process and the requirements defined by quality
standards.
Best Practise-5 : Prevent Future Deficiencies

The final step closes the loop.

• Learn why the deficiency happened and adjust the quality control process so
it doesn’t happen again.
• Make sure the item is included in the acceptance criteria and communicated
to all parties.
• Add to your checklist system and include it in your inspection plan.
“Success is when you don’t see the issue again and you are that much closer to
achieving first time quality with zero defects”
 CASE STUDY
(Kolkata Flyover Collapse- April 2016)
 Background

•To overcome the traffic congestion on the major roads in the business
districts, the Govt of West Bengal undertook construction of several
flyovers to ease the traffic flow in certain localities.
•Proposal was moved for a 2.5km stretch flyover in Central Kolkata, having
2 serviceable roads with provision for expansion to 4 lanes in future as
traffic flow grows.
• Construction of the flyover started in 2007 and target completion was
scheduled in 2009 to cater to the needs for uninterrupted construction. But
due to various constraints specially in getting regulatory clearances as
work site situation changed and also due to fund constraint , the contractor
had financial difficulties in progressing as per schedule. The new target was
set at 2014.
• About 75% of the work was completed and it was expected that the
facilities will be commissioned in 2016. Unfortunately, on March 26, 2016
part of the flyover structure collapsed causing loss of lives and damage to
properties.
 Basic parameters
• The flyover has to be constructed on a very busy stretch of the city road
network. Therefore, the construction must not create hurdles to the traffic flow.
Moreover, the area is highly congested so the project must be completed within
very tight time schedule. Keeping all these factors in mind it was decided to
adopt structural steel structures for the superstructure
• Box girders were chosen for columns and beams forming rigid portal frames on
RCC foundations supported on bored cast in pipes driven to 45m below the
ground level
• The soil being predominantly sandy clay with mix of Gangetic alluvium having
bearing capacity around 8 T/m². This required the piles to be on a bed of
compact sandstone at average 45m depth
• To expedite the project completion and reduce site work, the super structure
was designed using structural steel portal of box sections erected over RCC
foundations supported on bored cast in situ piles driven 45m under the GL
where a layer of compact sandstone exists. On top of the steel super structure a
cast in situ RCC slab 200mm thick was designed topped by a 100mm PC wearing
course and finally 50mm thick mastic asphalt surfacing was laid.
 WHAT WENT WRONG ?

Title YYYY-MM-DD 21
• It is to be noted that failure has occurred when the bridge
was not subjected to any live load from moving vehicles.
Thus, it can be inferred that there was some basic design
deficiency.
• The longitudinal beams spanning between the portal
hammer head frames had no bracings on the
compression flanges to prevent lateral buckling. Such
buckling imposed additional horizontal loads on the
portal frame box girders . At the portal frame hammer
heads, the horizontal box girder beams should have
extra depth at the knee joint to withstand additional
moments resulting frommoment redistribution according
to stiffness of each member at the joint
• Inadequate QA/QC measures at shop and site during
fabrication and site erection of the portal frames. Normal
practice for acceptance of structural steel is to depend on
mill test certificates. In such girders it is advisable to carry
out USG tests and Pulse echo testing of steel plates to
ascertain that they are free from internal defects.
• A special report of IIT Kharagpur was submitted before
the government , where it was stated that lack of quality
checking, approval of faulty design and usage of
disparate raw materials caused the fatal accident, sources
said.
Failure causes leading to bridge failure
 Aftermath

Three employees of the

executing agency & two Senior
engineers of the Implementation
Thirty 36 people dead with many
agency were suspended. The
other cases of fatal injuries.
police registered a case of
murder & attempt to murder
against the executing agency.
Benefits of implementation of Quality Assurance plan

Customer Satisfaction:
Quality Control helps to ensure that the product or service meets the needs and expectations of the
customer. This leads to increased customer satisfaction, repeat business, and positive reviews.
Reputation Management:
High-quality products and services are critical to maintaining a good reputation for a company. Quality
Control helps to identify and correct defects before they reach the customer, reducing the risk of
negative feedback and damage to the company’s reputation.
Cost Reduction:
Quality Control can help to reduce costs by identifying and fixing defects early in the production
process. This prevents rework, wastage of materials and reduces the risk of having to replace defective
products.
Improved Efficiency:
A well-designed and implemented Quality Control process can help to streamline the production
process and improve efficiency. This leads to increased productivity, reduced waste, and improved
profitability.
Compliance:
For many industries, compliance with regulations and standards is critical. Quality Control helps to
ensure that products and services meet these regulations and standards, reducing the risk of fines and
legal penalties.