Old San Francisco Bay Bridge Piling Imploded Without A Hitch

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A piece of San Francisco Bay history was blown to bits Saturday morning.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports Saturday that transportation officials used 22,000 pounds of dynamite to level the largest remaining pier of the old eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.

The implosion occurred at 7:17 a.m. and largely underwater. Spectators saw little other than a blast of water heaved 100 feet into the air.

The bridge was completed in 1936, but its eastern span was badly damaged by the 1989 earthquake. It was replaced in 2013.

The California Department of Transportation set a wooden and steel mat on top of the 80-by-140-foot concrete pier to keep debris from flying upward and onto the new eastern bridge next door.

The six-second blast was scheduled to take advantage of slack tide and light traffic on the new bridge, which was shut down for five to 15 minutes during the operation. Traffic was re-opened by 7:20 a.m.