The Kinzua Bridge or the Kinzua Viaduct (, ) was a railroad trestle that spanned Kinzua Creek in McKean County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The bridge was tall and long. Most of its structure collapsed during a tornado in July 2003. Billed as the "Eighth Wonder of the World", the wrought iron original 1882 structure held the record for the tallest railroad bridge in the world for two years. In 1900, the bridge was dismantled and simultaneously rebuilt out of steel to allow it to accommodate heavier trains. It stayed in commercial service until 1959, when it was sold to a salvage company. In 1963 the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania purchased the bridge as the centerpiece of a state park. Restoration of the bridge began in 2002, but before it was finished a tornado struck the bridge in 2003, causing a large portion of the bridge to collapse. Corroded anchor bolts holding the bridge to its foundations failed, contributing to the collapse. Before its collapse, the Kinzua Bridge was ranked as the fourth-tallest railway bridge in the United States. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977 and as a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark by the American Society of Civil Engineers in 1982. The ruins of the Kinzua Bridge are in Kinzua Bridge State Park off U.S. Route 6 near the borough of Mount Jewett, Pennsylvania. Original construction and service In 1882, Thomas L. Kane, president of the New York, Lake Erie and Western Railway (NYLE&W), was faced with the challenge of building a branch line off the main line in Pennsylvania, from Bradford south to the coalfields in Elk County. The fastest way to do so was to build a bridge across the Kinzua Valley. The only other alternative would have been to lay an additional of track over rough terrain. When built, the bridge was larger than any ever attempted and over twice as large as the largest similar structure at the time, the Portage Bridge over the Genesee River in western New York. The first Kinzua Bridge was built by a crew of 40 from of wrought iron in just 94 working days, between May 10 and August 29, 1882. The reason for the short construction time was that scaffolding was not used in the bridge's construction; instead a gin pole was used to build the first tower, then a traveling