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Hot Weather Could Cause Pavement Issues

June 01, 2023 Steve Schwaller

(Undated)– Officials are warning about hot weather and the danger it poses to highways and interstates. Chris Brakke of the Iowa Department of Transportation says it can cause the pavement to heave upward, or buckle…

“The concrete pavements are expanding due to the higher temperatures. The other thing that plays into that is usually that happens a lot when the nighttime temperatures don’t cool off a whole lot so we just continue to build heat up in that pavement.”

He says it’s more likely to occur with older pavement…

“It happens on a lot of older pavements. Over time the joints that we have cut into the pavements will get filled in so there’s less room for any expansion to occur, thermal expansion.”

Brakke adds there is no way to predict when or where buckling will occur…

“Pay really close attention when we do have those really hot extended periods of high temperatures. We can’t predict it. We know it probably will start occurring but we certainly can’t predict when and we can’t predict exactly where that will happen, either, because it’s so variable.”

Hitting buckled pavement can do serious damage to a vehicle.

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