Spotlight: Giants underground (January 2003)
Gotthard Tunnel – Safety first
Inside the Gotthard massif in Switzerland, there’s already a lot of traffic: up to 700 tunnel specialists are
at work, at temperatures of around 45 degrees Celsius. HOCHTIEF is helping to build the 57 kilometer long
twin tube tunnel between the cantons of Ticino and Uri, which on completion will be the longest rail tunnel
in the world. And that means confronting all the challenges which the hard Alpine rock imposes on man and machine.
The first thing the tunnel experts do is to ensure that everyone can keep a cool head, despite the 2000 meters of rock above them. Ventilation and other measures maintain the air temperature in the work areas at a constant 28 degrees C. Together with its subsidiary Streif Baulogistik, the Group's construction logistics arm, HOCHTIEF has helped to develop the communications concept for the radio intercom, the telephones, the automatic access control system, the registration facilities and the control technology for the building operations. In addition, Streif Baulogistik has provided parts of the site power system and two emergency escape containers.
The safety demands made on rail tunnels are extremely high, for instance because highly explosive goods
are sometimes transported through them. But HOCHTIEF is totally familiar with all safety and security requirements,
just as it is with handling the very latest technologies – as a glance at the Sophia Tunnel project south of
Rotterdam in the Netherlands will show.
