A bridge under work on the E42 highway in La Louvière, Belgium, collapsed on Wednesday afternoon, killing one person and injuring 16 others, according to the evidence supplied for this story. RTBF reports that the collapse happened around 2 p.m. and that the final toll included one dead worker, two people hospitalized and 14 others involved in the incident. The bridge was part of a demolition project on one of two twin spans over the canal.
The report says workers were on the bridge deck when the structure gave way. A barge positioned below the bridge for debris collection was struck by falling material, and two workers inside the barge were extracted. One worker had been reported missing during the afternoon before rescue crews recovered the body and attempted resuscitation. The report also says about 40 emergency personnel were deployed to the site.
The incident interrupted traffic on the E42 and prompted the opening of a communal coordination center and a nearby reception point for victims and families. RTBF reports that psychosocial support was still under way later in the day. The local labour prosecutor also attended the scene, showing that investigators moved quickly to examine how the collapse unfolded.
The evidence indicates that the bridge was old and scheduled for demolition as part of a larger reconstruction project. The Sofico director quoted in the report said the span dated from the 1960s and that work was already intended to replace it with a new bridge. He also said the project was expected to last two years, with completion planned for February 2026. That context matters because it shows the collapse happened during controlled works, not during normal road use.
What remains unresolved in the supplied evidence is the specific cause of the failure. The report says that determining the cause will be essential before the construction plan can be reorganized. At this stage, the verified facts are limited to the casualty count, the setting, the demolition work, and the emergency response that followed the collapse.
The bridge collapse also illustrates how construction work can create acute risk even when road traffic has already been rerouted or restricted. The supplied report says circulation on the bridge heading toward Charleroi had been interrupted because of the works, while traffic on the twin span toward Mons had only been slowed. In other words, the incident happened at a site already under active management, which may matter later for accountability but does not yet establish fault.
The fact that a victim had been missing and was then recovered by rescue crews means the final toll took shape over time rather than instantly. That sort of sequence is common in collapses, where workers may be trapped, thrown or hidden by debris. The evidence does not say whether the dead person was on the bridge deck, the barge or elsewhere, so the article should avoid that specificity.
The broader takeaway is that a planned demolition turned into a lethal accident, and the emergency system had to respond on multiple fronts: rescue, traffic diversion, family support and labor inspection. Those layers make the event more than a single structural failure; they make it a workplace disaster with immediate public consequences.
