News Gotthard base tunnel has break-through

[Urwumpe]

Just in these minutes, the tunnel drilling machine is drilling past the final 1.5 meters of rock completing the longest tunnel in history (about ten minutes to go)... thought this will be interesting, since a 57 km tunnel connecting the rail roads between northern and southern Europe might be a major event. :hello:

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotthard_Base_Tunnel"]Gotthard Base Tunnel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]

http://neat.ch/en/?no_cache=1

 

[jedidia]

darn you beat me to it. Wanted to post about this at two (local time, about 2 and a half hours ago), but was late already for an apointement...

Anyways, they finally made it. I remember them beginning the drilling when I was a little kid, and was like OMG they'll still be at it when I'll be thirty (which was quite a tremendous age to imagine at the time...).

It's not yet finished however, it'll be at least another 6 years before the tunnel can be taken into operation. I also found out that I payed over 1300 bucks for this tunnel :blink: Well, probably not, because my residence hasn't been in Switzerland for some time, but that just means that another bugger paid more. And to think that now the italians are protesting because they don't want to pay the neccessary extension of the railroad net at their northern border, which will only cost a fraction of what this mammoth-project consumes.

 

[dougkeenan]

What? No addon?

 

[Turbinator]

I absolutely love maga-engeneering on this scale.
It always reminds me that nothing is impossible.