At 10 p.m. on August 31, floodlights illuminated the construction site of the Can Tho–Ca Mau Expressway in Long My Ward, Can Tho City. Amid the roar of compactors and stone spreaders, bursts of laughter and animated chatter from hundreds of workers and engineers filled the night air. Despite light rain, the atmosphere remained lively and industrious.
“Working overnight during the holiday is exhausting, but we are proud to contribute our efforts so this national project can be completed by year’s end. It will make travel and trade much easier for the people of the Mekong Delta,” said Le Van Sang, a worker from Nghe An responsible for soil preloading.
That spirit of “braving sun and rain, racing against time” is spreading across all sections of the Can Tho–Ca Mau Expressway, even down to the southernmost stretches in Ca Mau Province.
On the morning of September 1, at the IC12 interchange leading to Ong Huong Bridge in Ca Mau’s Ho Thi Ky Commune, roller driver Huu Quy explained, “Today I was assigned to work on the service road. With trucks constantly hauling in materials, the ground gets rutted. My job is to compact and level it so the trucks can pass smoothly and construction goes on uninterrupted.”
Engineer Phan Thanh Thuan, supervising this section, reported that the Ong Huong Bridge has already been asphalted; some areas have been paved with crushed stone, while others are still being layered. “The weather this season is unpredictable. To safeguard both progress and quality, we seize every dry spell and work continuously, regardless of day, night, or holiday,” he said.
Mr. Nguyen Phuoc Duc, General Director of EVN Southern Power Corporation, visited several projects on September 1—including the Ho Tram 110kV substation in HCMC, medium- and low-voltage lines in Dong Nai, and the Tri An–Thanh Phu 110kV line upgrade—bringing gifts and encouragement to workers laboring in difficult conditions.
According to Mr. Tran Van Thi, Director of the My Thuan Project Management Unit (the Can Tho–Ca Mau Expressway investor), contractors mobilized 139 work fronts during the National Day holiday, with 2,449 personnel and 1,239 machines operating non-stop. The expressway is targeted for completion by December 19, 2025. To date, roughly 75 percent of the workload has been accomplished, with key tasks underway including soil unloading, embankment building, crushed-stone compaction, asphalt paving, and installation of traffic safety systems.
In Dong Thap Province, contractors on the Cao Lanh–An Huu Expressway also deployed more than 400 engineers and workers, along with hundreds of specialized machines, across about 40 active work sites during the holiday.
A representative from the provincial Project Management Board for Civil and Industrial Construction Works said that long-standing challenges—shortages of construction materials and incomplete site clearance—have now been largely resolved. Taking advantage of the dry weather, contractors are concentrating manpower and resources to accelerate progress while safeguarding quality. By the end of August 2025, Component 1 of the Cao Lanh–An Huu Expressway had reached 44.66 percent completion.
The project management board pledged to intensify supervision to ensure construction quality, while actively supporting contractors in removing obstacles to keep the project firmly on schedule.
