Womack testified before a House subcommittee on science and technology Wednesday along with a panel of engineers who are bridge experts.

Utah is in a much better position than many states, he said, because the state has no long-span bridges. Also, the Interstate 15 reconstruction that took place in the 1990s took care of many problem overpasses.

“Overall, I think the state of Utah is in good shape,” Womack said.

Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. wants to be sure. After the Minnesota collapse this summer, he ordered the Utah Department of Transportation to conduct an extra review of the state's critical bridges or ones that have shown weaknesses in the past.

UDOT expects to finish that effort by the end of October, but so far Dave Eixenberger, UDOT's bridge operations engineer, said his crew has found nothing commuters should be worried about.

Utah has about 2,800 bridges and a little more than 210 being labeled “structurally deficient.” Those bridges are not necessarily unsafe, though they usually have limitations on speed or vehicle weight.

Eixenberger said most of the reviews are done by sight alone, a fact that Womack said needs to change.

He wants Utah and the rest of the nation to more regularly use sophisticated inspection methods, such as ground penetrating radar or ultrasounds.

In his prepared remarks, Womack called for “a more rigorous inspection and testing protocol,” which may have helped in Minnesota. He said the I-35 bridge that collapsed had been inspected and issues were found, but instead of acting on those concerns, Minnesota officials decided to inspect the bridge more regularly.

“When you do find bad things with a bridge what do you do next?" he asked. "That is not at all a defined process."

Womack maintains the high-tech approach, called non-destructive testing, may have helped stave off this tragedy.

Eixenberger has worked with Womack on such tools, but he is not ready to move away from the standard process.

“We still feel visual inspections are the primary tool,” he said. “Non-destructive techniques are only a supplement.”

Womack also called for more funding and he lamented the declining number of civil engineers graduating from U.S. colleges.

But these are obstacles that must be overcome as what he calls “the baby boom bridges” age and crumble.

“We as a nation can no longer ignore this growing problem,” he said.

mcanham@sltrib.com