PORT AREA, Manila — Seven years ago, there were already concerns about the structural integrity of the ₱1.2-billion Cabagan-Santa Maria bridge that collapsed in Isabela province due to “cracks” that government inspectors already noticed before it was opened to the public last month.

This according to a senior official of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) who revealed the condition of the bridge when it was inspected by the agency’s structural engineers in 2018.

At the hearing of the Senate blue ribbon committee, public works undersecretary Eugenio Pipo Jr. disclosed that the project engineer first reported a “structural failure” on the concrete slab of Span 8 of the collapsed bridge, prompting the DPWH to seek a third-party entity to check the structure.

From its original cost of ₱413 million in 2014, the government spent more than triple of its initial budget to complete the 990-meter bridge, which collapsed while a dump truck loaded with stones was passing through its third segment last February 27.

“The integrity (of the bridge) is already questionable at that time because (while) it is not yet subjected to load, there were already perceived defects. There must be something wrong,” Pipo told the medua after the three-hour proceedings.

He added that those involved in the project, including the private contractor, RD Interior Junior Construction Corp., were just passing the blame on each other.

“That’s why we hired a third-party consultant. But there was no definite (finding) whose fault is it,” he further said.

Answering queries from Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, who presided over the hearing, Pipo admitted the government had awarded a separate contract worth ₱275 million to RD Interior in May 2023 for the retrofitting of the bridge.

But Cayetano questioned the DPWH’s decision to bid out the repair job, pointing out that this should have been done by the contractor at no cost to the government.

“Isn’t that an anomaly? If there were cracks, who should pay for the repair? That bridge is less than 15 years old,” Cayetano pointed out to Pipo.

“You did not include in your findings the cause of the problem when you know that [the bridge] is still under warranty . . . Whether the cracks were due to the design or not, who should be responsible for that?” the committee chair asked.

In response, Pipo said they were still in the process of creating a committee that would look into the collapse of the bridge even as the DPWH has yet to place any of its personnel under preventive suspension two weeks after the incident happened.

This further irked Cayetano, who noted that the DPWH was allocated with ₱1.1 trillion budget this year but “it has been two weeks since (the collapse of the Isabela bridge) occurred.

"Is this not urgent for the DPWH? I am very disappointed with how the DPWH is taking this . . . They don’t even have a working theory (on why the bridge collapsed) two weeks after it happened,” Cayetano concluded.