The St. Gothard Tunnel.

Thames Star, Volume XI, Issue 3551, 13 May 1880, Page 2

The St. Gothard Tunnel.

The correspondent of the London Times at Airolo in his letter notifying the completion of this wonderful work, girei the following interesting particulars :—

The piercing of this, the longest tunnel in the world, has thus been achieved in seven years and five months—a rapidity of execution quite unprecedented, for relatively to its length the St. Gothard has been bored in a fourth of the time eccupied in the boring of the Hauenstein tunnel, and in less, than half the time taken by the Mont Cenis. This great advance in the art of tunnel driving is due to the more extended application of machinery, and above all to the efficiency of the air compressors invented by Professor Colladon, of Geneva. The perforators, actuated by these compressors, do their work with marvellous swiftness. In two hours one machine drills 26 holes I*2o metre deep in a face of rock some 2 meters square. The holes are then filled with.- dynamite, charged, and fired, every explosion dislodging some 2§ cubic metres of rock. The point of attack for the perforators is always the upper part of the finished tunnel of the future; the floor of the passage they clear out being after* wards blasted and wrought down by hand to the required level. The locomotives used in the tunnel are moved by compressed air, and ventilation is provided from the same source. Hones-are. alto used for dragging the wagons, but owing - to the intense heat and the closeness, the mortality among'them is very* great. Out of a stud of forty tea die on an average every month. The men work • night and day in shifts of eight hours each ;^the labour is very trying, and they are compelled to take frequent holidays. Great circumspection has had to be exercised in the admission of outsiders to the galleries, as a walk of several miles'iu the stifling heat and vitiated atmosphere might easily prove fatal to persons with weak hearts or a tendency to congestion of the brain; and even the healthy who venture in for the first time have often occasion to regret their temerity. The scene in the interior of the tunnel is weird in the extreme: the pitchy darkness relieved only by the, glare of a few lamps, the shrieking of locomotives, the blowing of horns, the.tramp of i horses, the vibration of the perforators, the explosion of mines, the continual passing of heavily-laden wagoni, . thesjk group of naked men plying pickaxe, spade, and ahovel —. all these things mingled together create an impression never to be forgotten. The completion of the work now that the two galleries are joined and a free circulation of air is established will be comparatively easy. The tunnel is expected to be ready for traffic by the end of September, and the entire system of which it is the centre in the summer of ]882. The great engineering triumph, of which the St. Gothard tunnel is at on<je the monument and consummation, though a peaceful, has not been a bloodless one. Between sixty and seventy men have been killed by the premature explosions of mines and other mishaps* many more have been seriously injured, and -those ' who have borne the heat and,burdens of the. day are well worthy of the medals that are about to be bestowed upon them a«d the fitt with which they are to be honoured at Airolo, and at which the Federal Council and probably the Governments of Germany and Italy will be represented.