Students turn da Vinci’s design to build world’s longest ice bridge

Leonardo da Vinci, besides being one of the greatest painters of his time, was also known for having some pretty design ideas, including that of an expansive stone bridge stretching across the Bosphorus River, a concept he never saw come to life.  

A group of students has brought in a few adjustments to the design and is building it to come up with a final structure that will be the world's longest ice bridge, reports Mentalfloss.com.

The project, titled "Bridge in Ice", began on December 28 in Juuka, Finland with a team of researchers and students from the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands working on it, and is expected to be completed in mid-February.

Da Vinci's model was supposed to be made of stone and would have spanned 790 feet across the strait of Bosphorus that connects Europe and Asia. This latest project, however, won't exactly be an icier version of da Vinci's design, and will stretch 115 feet.

The engineers will combine paper fibres and water to prepare a mixture that would be sprayed onto massive inflated moulds, which, when frozen, will produce reinforced ice that will be three times stronger than regular ice, strong enough for pedestrians to walk across the bridge. The team also plans to drive a car over the surface of the bridge to test its stability.

The project will see a whopping 900 tons of ice to be used to complete it, reports Live Science, and Juuka's current temperature, which well below zero centigrade, makes Finland a smart location for the "Bridge in Ice" to be in.