Page 7 - TunnelTalk Annual Review 2010 Preview

In March 2011, the world’s longest rail tunnel ever undertaken prepared to record its final breakthrough deep beneath the mountains of the Swiss Alps. The final breakthrough to connect all headings of the first tunnel into one long tube
through the base of the Gotthard Massive was recorded in October 2010.
Making history at Gotthard
History was made on Friday 15 October 2010 when the first Bodio-Faido TBM broke through into the drill+blast heading from Sedrun to finish 57km of rail tunnel through the base of the Swiss Alps from Erstfeld in the north and Bodio in the south.
Swiss politicians and dignitaries, project directors and contract managers as well as senior managers of the leading suppliers and the workers themselves all gathered for an official breakthrough on Friday afternoon when the TBM fired up at 2pm to cut the last 1.5m of rock and mark this truly monumental feat of civil engineering and endurance.
The crews of the TBMs and drill+blast headings blazed a trail. This last breakthrough occurred
TunnelTalk reporting
nearly 2,000m below the top of the Alps and more than 8km from the nearest exit through the 800m deep shaft at Sedrun, and more than 13km from the access adit at Faido.
On a project of this magnitude - the longest, largest, most ambitious and most technically demanding tunnelling project of this age - there have been serious set backs and delays as crews have tunnelled into the unknown. Extreme geological conditions buried a TBM heading from the Amsteg adit for more than six months and had another TBM from the Faido adit at a standstill for five months from March to July 2010.
These and other challenges, some not related to the excavation work, have caused a slip of some
Celebration of an epic achievement
www.TunnelTalk.com TunnelTalk ANNUAL REVIEw 2010
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