A few seconds of drone footage lately made the rounds on social media: a ribbon of road threading through a mountain whose peak looks literally sliced in two.
The clip is spectacular and it sparked dramatic headlines: “China cuts mountain in half to build world’s highest highway.” But headlines and clips can blur engineering facts.
On closer inspection, the footage documents a bold civil-engineering solution in southwestern China that’s part of the Guizhou Luan Expressway. The Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge project, a bridge that will set a new record for deck height, not a highway sitting at 4,700 metres above sea level.
What we’re actually seeing
The project is in Guizhou province, a landscape of knife-edged karst ridges and deep gorges that has forced engineers to get creative.
To connect remote county towns and slash travel time, builders have sometimes literally removed ridge tops, carved new alignments into rock, and installed long span bridge structures across chasms.
The most dramatic element is the Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge, whose deck will sit about 625 metres (2,051 ft) above the canyon floor, taller than the Eiffel Tower by deck height. Thus making it the world’s highest bridge by that measurement when it opens.
The bridge is a key span on the expressway between Liuzhi and Anlong. It is roughly 2,890 meters long as part of a larger steel-truss crossing.
Why cut a mountain instead of tunnelling or rerouting?
Guizhou is one of China’s most mountainous provinces: roads that follow valley contours can take hours to cover short distances.
For strategic, economic and social reasons, reducing travel time, linking markets and developing tourism, authorities prefer more direct routes even when they require spectacular engineering.
In some places, the only practical way to create a stable, straight roadway approach to a long bridge is to remove a ridge or reshape peaks rather than build long winding approaches or deep tunnels.
That decision is driven by geography, cost-benefit calculations, and local construction technology.
China’s experience building dozens of very high bridges in the province over the last decade made this approach technically feasible.
How big is the bridge project
- Deck height: ~625 m (2,051 ft) above the canyon floor. This is the measure that makes it the world’s highest bridge by deck height.
- Total span / length: the project includes very long steel-truss sections. Reported overall lengths for the bridge structure are in the multi-kilometre range (about 2,890 m for the bridge expressway segment).
- Completion timeline: Chinese state media and provincial releases said the main structure was finished in early 2025. The bridge was expected to open in the second half of 2025. Local updates in mid-2025 reported the project at 95–98% completion.
Engineering feats and techniques
Building a bridge 625 m above a gorge and anchoring long steel trusses across rapidly changing wind and seismic conditions demanded specialized methods:
- Massive segmented steel truss sections were fabricated and hoisted into place; some reports cite tens of thousands of tonnes of steel used in the main structure.
- GPS-guided cable cranes, remote sensing, wind-monitoring and sophisticated anti-corrosion measures were used during assembly and will be part of ongoing maintenance.
- Engineers favored a high, long span suspension/steel-truss hybrid design to minimize in-gorge supports and manage construction risks.
What the project promises: connectivity and economics
Chinese officials have framed the expressway and bridge as transformational for local economies. What used to be an hour-long, winding journey can now be reduced to minutes. It will open up trade, tourism and easier access to jobs, healthcare and education for remote communities.
Provincial transport bureaus have emphasized economic integration between Guiyang, Anshun, Liupanshui and Qianxinan as a goal. Local governments also expect the structure to become a tourist draw.
Environmental and social questions
Spectacle and utility do not eliminate controversy. Cutting into ridgelines and reshaping mountain topography raises standard concerns:
- Ecosystem impact: Guizhou’s karst landscape supports unique microhabitats; heavy excavation can accelerate erosion or modify drainage patterns. Environmental reviews were reported, but independent ecological monitoring is limited in public reporting.
- Visual and cultural landscape: local communities sometimes contest large visual changes to familiar landscapes. In China, provincial governments often stress the developmental benefits when balancing these tradeoffs.
- Safety and maintenance: ultra-high structures face harsher weather and unique maintenance needs. State media highlights monitoring systems and corrosion protection, but long-term resilience remains an engineering challenge.
Why the “4,700-metre highway” claim is misleading
Some viral posts and comments conflated two different metrics. Bridge deck height (the vertical drop to the canyon) vs altitude above sea level (how high above sea level the roadway sits).
The Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge’s deck height is ~625 m. That’s what makes it the world’s highest bridge by deck height.
Guizhou’s geography is rugged but not at altitudes like 4,700 m. 4,700 m is more typical of high Tibetan plateau passes. There are indeed highways and passes around the Tibetan plateau that cross elevations above 4,000 m, but those are separate projects with different engineering and ecological contexts.
The viral clip relates to Guizhou’s canyon bridge and expressway, not a 4,700-metre plateau highway.
The human angle: workers, communities, and the awe factor
State reporting and local media highlight the human stories. Bridge crews working at dizzying heights, GPS-guided lifts completed under wind alarms, and residents who will gain faster access to markets and hospitals.
Drone footage captures the emotional paradox that keeps audiences watching, the same scene that makes many uneasy also symbolizes rapid, tangible modernization for isolated towns.
For villagers whose journeys were once slow and precarious, a steel bridge hanging above a gorge can mean opportunity. For the rest of the world, it’s visual proof of how infrastructure shapes landscapes.
Conclusion
The viral footage shows real, dramatic engineering work in Guizhou on the Guizhou Luan Expressway and the Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge. It is extraordinary, but not a highway at 4,700 metres above sea level.
The bridge’s 625 m deck height is the technical reason it will set a world record for “highest bridge” (deck-to-ground measure).
Completion was reported in 2025 with provincial authorities expecting the span to open and begin service later that year.
The choice to cut ridgelines is an engineering tradeoff: faster connections and lower travel times versus environmental and cultural costs.
Independent, long-term ecological monitoring and local consultation are the kinds of things journalists and researchers will want to watch as the structure enters operation.
