US Army

A vital tool

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Italian Campaign, likely Tuscan North Apennines, end 1944-early 1945: an US Army vehicle, passing over a Bailey Bridge assembled by US Engineers over a creek as replacement of the original bridge destroyed by retreating Germans troops serving a road become an important link between the US troops and the Brazilian Expeditionary Force. The invention of Donald Bailey, a British engineer, for first time fielded during the Campaign in Tunisia, revealed oneself vital in the Italian Campaign providing an excellent solution to the problem of the bridges destroyed in great number both by the Allied air raids and by retreating Axis troops. By the end of the war, the British and American Engineering assembled over 3,000 Bailey Bridges in Sicily and Italy which covered a total of 89 km (55 mile) with an average length of 30 m (100 feet). The record was, perhaps, one Bailey assembled over the Sangro river bridge in Italy, spanned 343 m (1,126 feet). Today some Bailey Bridges still existing and are in use on few secondary routes. Victor Sierra