perplexus.info :: Science : Route Step, MARCH

Route Step, MARCH (Posted on 2005-04-16)

In the Military there is a long standing tradition that you do not march soldiers over a bridge in step. When marching and approaching a bridge the command of Route Step, MARCH is given. This command keeps the soldiers marching in formation, but every soldier is allowed to march at her/his own step. Although this is widely practiced in the Army, I found very few who knew the reason why.

What could have possibly prompted this tradition?

Submitted by Bruce Brantley

Rating: 5.0000 (1 votes)

Solution: (Hide)

The reason is the possibility of the bridge collapsing.
There are many stories of bridges that collapsed due to soldiers marching across them.
It is possible for this to happen due to the resonant frequency of the bridge. Much like the high pitch that can cause a glass to shatter, marching at a rate that causes vibrations at the resonant frequency of the bridge can cause it to collapse.

There are several excellent examples in the comments and Juggler offered a very interesting alternate theory.

Comments: ( You must be logged in to post comments.)

Subject	Author	Date
No Subject	Henry Pugh	2024-03-14 05:19:21
Puzzle Thoughts	K Sengupta	2024-02-16 03:15:57
Vibration Amplification	Jack Lim	2006-03-02 03:49:54
I know it	Andy	2005-05-07 18:43:40
Some thoughts...	Erik O.	2005-04-18 15:30:19
re(2): Simple ...	Juggler	2005-04-17 09:40:09
re: Simple ...	Hugo	2005-04-16 19:06:15
Simple ...	Larry	2005-04-16 16:13:35
Bruce,did we meet before?	Rex	2005-04-16 15:03:28
Guesses	Old Original Oskar!	2005-04-16 14:50:05
I think...	Stephen Ticsay	2005-04-16 14:49:45

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