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Officials looking to reduce suicides on Hoover Dam bypass bridge

Nevada transportation officials are looking at ways to reduce the number of suicides at the Hoover Dam bypass bridge after a fourth person jumped into the Colorado River from the 900-foot-high bridge.

Nevada transportation officials are expected to discuss suicides from the Mike O’Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge at their August or September meeting.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports the federal Bureau of Reclamation plans to use grant money to install a dozen boxes on the bridge that carries traffic on U.S. 93, from Arizona to Nevada.

Among the possible preventive measures are netting, a fence, or a more restrictive bridge railing. It has also been suggested that 8-foot concrete columns be placed close together on the bridge so tourists could still capture the view of Hoover Dam, from above, but those who are suicidal would be unable to squeeze through the space between columns.

Two people have jumped to their deaths from the bypass bridge in the past two weeks.

San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge has long been the location of the world’s highest suicide rate, with some 1,558 people having died there in its 75-year history.