The special team of officers is trained by the PSP’s psychology department in how to approach potentially suicidal individuals threatening to throw themselves off the 70-metre-high structure, which crosses the Tagus River.
A report by newspaper Diário de Notícias reveals that last year the team, which patrols the bridge by motorbike, saved 25 would-be victims.
So far this year the officers have prevented ten people from jumping, among them a troubled teacher, a couple and a hospital patient.
Inaugurated nearly 50 years ago on 6 August 1966, the bridge stretches more than two kilometres across the Tagus river to connect Almada to the Portuguese capital,
Lisbon.
It stands at 70 metres in height and is the 27th largest suspension bridge in the world, often compared to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, US.
The bridge was renamed ’25 de Abril’ following the Carnation Revolution in 1974.