Channel Tunnel diameter North Rail Boring Machine passes through the vast undersea UK crossover on its journey to France.
The Channel Tunnel undersea diameter North Rail Tunnel Boring Machine passes through the vast UK Crossover Cavern on its way to meet with its French TBM counterpart in mid Channel. Because Tunnel Boring Machines are so huge, they are usually assembled and dismantled underground and it is very rare for a complete boring machine with its long back-up train to be visible. However, when the two UK rail tunnel boring machines passed through the Crossover, it was possible to see 'fully armed' TBMs in all their glory. The Channel Tunnel is no ordinary project. The four types of cross-channel service that the Tunnel offers - conventional freight and passenger trains, plus two types of road vehicle shuttle have made it into the busiest railway in the world. The fast and efficient movement of road and rail traffic into, through and out of the Eurotunnel system is integral to that success. The Channel Tunnel is one of the wonders of the modern world. It is thirty-two miles long at an average depth of 45 metres below the sea-bed, the longest undersea tunnel and the second longest rail tunnel in the world (only the Seikan Tunnel in Japan is longer). It was built between 1987 and 1994 by Anglo-French consortium TransManche Link and is owned and operated by Anglo-French Eurotunnel plc. It opened for business in late 1994, offering services including a shuttle train for car, coach and freight vehicles, a Eurostar high-speed passenger service linking London with Paris and Brussels and a rail freight service. The tunnel boring machines were specially designed for excavating the chalk marl rock which lies beneath the seabed along the tunnel route. Digging the tunnel took 15 thousand workers around 170 million man-hours over 7 years with tunnelling happening simultaneously from both ends.
Size: 3310px × 3310px
Location: 40m under sea bed, 8kms from Dover, Europe.
Photo credit: © qaphotos.com / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
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