A Bridge Built on the Sea#
Can you imagine building a 55-kilometer bridge across the sea?
This is the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge — the world’s longest cross-sea bridge.
It connects three cities: Hong Kong, Zhuhai, and Macao.
It used to take 3 hours by boat from Hong Kong to Zhuhai; now it takes only 45 minutes by car.
Why Build This Bridge?#
Hong Kong, Zhuhai, and Macao face each other across the sea, making travel inconvenient.
Building a bridge to connect them allows people, goods, and money to flow faster between the three cities.
But the problem is — the waters between these three cities are very busy, with thousands of ships passing daily. A regular bridge would block ship traffic.
The “Bridge-Island-Tunnel” Solution#
Engineers came up with a clever solution: “Bridge-Island-Tunnel.”
What does that mean?
- Bridge: Most of the route is a bridge over the sea
- Island: Two artificial islands were built in the middle
- Tunnel: Between the islands is a 6.7-kilometer underwater tunnel
Why build an underwater tunnel? Because above is the Hong Kong International Airport’s flight path — no tall towers allowed.
So cars drive on the bridge, dive into the underwater tunnel, then return to the bridge — like a giant dragon diving underwater and resurfacing.
How Do You Build Artificial Islands?#
At each end of the underwater tunnel is an artificial island.
How do you build an island in the middle of the sea? Engineers used 120 giant steel cylinders.
Each cylinder is 22 meters in diameter and 55 meters tall — like a giant soda can.
These “cans” were sunk to the seabed, arranged in a circle, then filled with sand — and the island appeared!
Each artificial island was completed in just 7 months, which was previously unimaginable.
Typhoon-Resistant Design#
The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge is in a typhoon-prone area.
Every summer, several typhoons pass through with winds up to Category 16.
The bridge is designed to withstand Category 16 typhoons and magnitude 8 earthquakes.
One year, the super typhoon “Hato” directly hit Zhuhai, and the bridge was completely unharmed.
Learn from the World#
The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge teaches us one thing: the bigger the challenge, the more clever the solution needs to be.
Ships need to pass, planes need to fly, typhoons need to be resisted — each is a difficult problem. But engineers didn’t use brute force; they came up with the clever “Bridge-Island-Tunnel” solution.
Sometimes, “going around” is smarter than “pushing through.”
Knowledge Card#
- Location: Guangdong Province, China, connecting Hong Kong, Zhuhai, and Macao
- Type: Modern Engineering Marvel
- Key Numbers: 55 km total length, 6.7 km underwater tunnel, opened in 2018
- Engineering Highlights: Bridge-Island-Tunnel design, 120 giant steel cylinders for artificial islands
- Fun Fact: The bridge’s design lifespan is 120 years, 20 years longer than ordinary bridges
- Source: Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge Authority