Editing Pontoon bridge (section)

{{Short description|Type of floating bridge}}
{{for-multi|related uses of "pontoon"|Float (nautical)|other uses|Pontoon (disambiguation)}}
{{Infobox bridge type
| image            = US Army crossing the Rhine on heavy ponton bridge at Worms, March, 1945.png
| image_title      = [[United States Army]] troops cross the [[Rhine]] on a heavy pontoon bridge during [[Operation Plunder]], March 1945<ref>Beck, Alfred M., et al., [http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/010/10-22/CMH_Pub_10-22.pdf ''The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181016023948/https://history.army.mil/html/books/010/10-22/CMH_Pub_10-22.pdf |date=2018-10-16 }}, Center of Military History (U.S. Army), 1985. The bridge was built by the 85th Engineer Heavy Combat Battalion on March 26, 1945 200 feet downstream from the demolished Ernst Ludwig highway bridge. It was named the Alexander Patch Bridge after the Seventh Army commander, General [[Alexander Patch]]. A stone tower of the former bridge is visible on the opposite bank.</ref>
| sibling_names    =
| descendent_names =
| ancestor_names   =
| carries          = Pedestrian, automobile, truck
| span_range       = Short to long
| material         = Various: steel, concrete, boats, barrels, plastic floats, appropriate decking material
| movable          = Generally not, but may have movable sections for watercraft passage
| design           = low
| falsework        = No}}

A '''pontoon bridge''' (or ponton bridge), also known as a '''floating bridge''', is a bridge that uses [[float (nautical)|floats]] or shallow-[[draft (hull)|draft]] [[boats]] to support a continuous deck for pedestrian and vehicle travel. The [[buoyancy]] of the supports limits the maximum load that they can carry.

Most pontoon bridges are temporary and used in wartime and civil emergencies. There are permanent pontoon bridges in civilian use that can carry highway traffic; generally, the relatively high potential for collapse and sinking (e.g. due to waves and collisions) and high continuous maintenance costs makes pontoons unattractive for most civilian construction. Permanent floating bridges are useful for sheltered water crossings if it is not considered economically feasible to suspend a bridge from anchored [[Pier (architecture)|pier]]s (such as in deep water). Such bridges can require a section that is elevated or can be raised or removed to allow waterborne traffic to pass. Notable permanent pontoon bridges include the [[Hood Canal Bridge]] and the [[Nordhordland Bridge]].

Pontoon bridges have been in use since ancient times and have been used to great advantage in many battles throughout history, such as the [[Battle of Garigliano (1503)|Battle of Garigliano]], the [[Battle of Oudenarde]], the [[Operation Plunder|crossing of the Rhine]] during [[World War II]], the [[Yom Kippur war|Yom Kippur War]], [[Operation Badr (1973)|Operation Badr]], the [[Iran–Iraq War]]'s [[Operation Dawn 8]], and most recently, in the 2022 [[Russian invasion of Ukraine]], after crossings over the [[Dnipro river|Dnipro River]] had been destroyed.