The massive Fatigue Carousel helps keep roads safe

Summary by Krater

Tom Scott visits the fatigue carousel in Nantes, France, an accelerated pavement testing facility built in 1984, to explain how it simulates decades of road wear in a few months.

From the video

Answers: How do engineers test road durability over decades without waiting years?

• accelerated pavement testing
• fatigue carousel
• road durability testing
• pavement stress and damage

What it concludes

• The fatigue carousel can simulate decades of road traffic and pavement stress in just a few weeks.
• Computer simulations and models for large infrastructure projects require real-world data from physical facilities like the fatigue carousel.