Silver Bridge Memorial

A memorial plaza where the Silver Bridge stood until December 15, 1967, when the suspension bridge collapsed into the Ohio River during rush hour. The disaster killed 46 people and drew renewed attention to the Mothman sightings that preceded it.

The Silver Bridge Memorial in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, marks the site of one of the most devastating bridge disasters in American history and one of the most haunted intersections in the state. Built in 1928, the Silver Bridge was an eyebar-chain suspension bridge that carried U.S. Route 35 over the Ohio River, connecting Point Pleasant to Gallipolis, Ohio. It earned its name from the silver-colored aluminum paint that coated its structure. The bridge was a pioneering design -- the first eyebar suspension bridge in the United States -- but that innovation contained the seed of its destruction.

On December 15, 1967, at the height of the 5:00 p.m. rush hour, a loud cracking noise described by witnesses as sounding like a gunshot or sonic boom split the air above the Ohio River. Within twenty seconds, the entire 1,460-foot main span of the Silver Bridge plunged into the forty-three-degree water, carrying thirty-two vehicles and their occupants with it. Forty-six people died that day. Two bodies were never recovered.

The subsequent investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the catastrophic failure originated from a single eyebar in one of the suspension chains. A manufacturing defect -- a flaw just 0.1 inches deep, smaller than the thickness of a dime -- had developed into a stress corrosion crack over the bridge's thirty-nine years of service. The failure of that one eyebar triggered a chain reaction that brought down the entire structure in seconds. The disaster led directly to the passage of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1968, which established the National Bridge Inspection Standards requiring regular inspection of all highway bridges in America.

The Silver Bridge collapse holds a unique place in American paranormal history because it coincided exactly with the end of the Mothman sightings that had gripped Point Pleasant for thirteen months. The last reported Mothman sighting occurred on the same day as the collapse. Some locals believe the Mothman was a supernatural warning of the impending disaster. Others maintain the creature caused the tragedy. The debate has never been settled.

The memorial stands at one of the major intersections of downtown Point Pleasant, at the exact spot where the road once approached the bridge to cross the Ohio River. Bricks bearing the names of all forty-six victims are set into the ground, and placards commemorate the disaster. Visitors to the memorial report an overwhelming sense of sadness and loss. Some have described hearing the sound of rushing water and grinding metal even on calm, quiet days. The spot where so many lives ended in twenty seconds of terror remains a place where the boundary between the living and the dead feels impossibly thin.