Eurotunnel

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Eurotunnel
Canal tunnel
Eurotunnel
Entering the Eurotunnel near Coquelles (France)
Official name Channel tunnel; Tunnel sous la Manche
use Railway tunnel
traffic connection High Speed ​​One , LGV North
place English Channel
length 50.45 km
Number of tubes 3
cross-section 2 × 7.6 m
1 × 4.8 m
Largest coverage min. 40 m to the seabed
construction
building-costs 15 billion euros
start of building December 15, 1987
completion June 20, 1993
business
operator Getlink
release November 14, 1994
Course of the Eurotunnel
Border line F-GB.png
location
Eurotunnel (Europe)
Red pog.svg
Red pog.svg
Coordinates
Folkestone 51 ° 5 ′ 49 ″  N , 1 ° 9 ′ 23 ″  E
Coquelles 50 ° 55 ′ 24 "  N , 1 ° 46 ′ 47"  E

The Eurotunnel (also Channel Tunnel - French Tunnel sous la Manche , English Channel Tunnel ) is a 50 km long railway tunnel between Folkestone in Kent ( United Kingdom ) and Coquelles near Calais ( France ). With a stretch of 37 km under the Dover Strait , it is the longest underwater tunnel in the world. The technical infrastructure (tunnel operation, monitoring and maintenance) as well as shuttle trains for motor vehicles are operated by the Getlink company. The Eurostar Group Ltd. operates high-speed trains with direct connections between major cities on both sides of the canal.

The long-planned and very costly tunneling project, preceded by some failed historical construction plans, was completed in 1994. The Eurotunnel consists of two single-track driving tunnels and an intermediate two-lane service tunnel for narrow road vehicles . The Eurotunnel has therefore provided a direct rail link between France and the United Kingdom since 1994.

designation

While the tunnel is consistently named after the canal in the languages ​​of the neighboring countries ( French: Tunnel sous la Manche , English Channel Tunnel , Dutch Kanaaltunnel ), in German it is often called Eurotunnel , after the operating company, which was officially named Eurotunnel in 1986 Groupe Eurotunnel had been founded but was renamed Getlink in November 2017 .

Geographical location

The Eurotunnel is located under the Dover Strait , a strait at the eastern end of the English Channel . The tunnel leads from the Cheriton district of the city of Folkestone in the English county of Kent to the village of Coquelles (4.5 km southwest of the city of Calais) in the French department of Pas-de-Calais . It runs in a north-west-south-east direction and connects the island of Great Britain with continental Europe .

The north-west portal of the Eurotunnel is located 2.5 km northwest of downtown Folkestone, which lies directly on the northern English Channel coast. Its southeast portal is just under two kilometers southwest of Coquelles and 3.5 km from the southern English Channel coast.

history

background

In 1751, the Frenchman Nicolas Desmaret proposed in his dissertation sur l'ancienne jonction de l'Angleterre à la France to create a tunnel connection between England and France. In 1802, the French mining engineer Albert Mathieu submitted a first serious draft for this. The connection should be operated with horse-drawn carriages . For this purpose, the Varne sandbank was to be turned into an artificial island with a horse exchange point. Air exchange should be guaranteed by chimneys that protruded a few meters above the water surface. The plan was not implemented because it was technically not feasible and the war between France and England broke out again. Napoléon Bonaparte raised the issue during the Amiens peace talks with British statesman Charles James Fox .

In 1803 a tunnel design by the Englishman Henri Mottray followed. However, fundamental technical problems remained unsolved.

Starting in 1834, the French civil engineer Thomé de Gamond presented further proposals over a period of almost 30 years, including the idea of ​​building a stilt-shaped transport system that would run on rails on the sea floor, but would keep the then newly invented railroad trains above sea level.

Canal tunnel proposal in the middle of the 19th century
Plan by Thomé de Gamond from 1856 for a canal tunnel with port and ventilation system on the Varne sandbank

In 1851, Hector Moreau, again a Frenchman, presented his idea of ​​laying a steel tunnel on the seabed . However, this tunnel did not materialize either because many political and, above all, technical requirements were not met.

1856 commissioned Napoléon III. a scientific commission to examine the feasibility. This described Thomé de Gamond's plans as feasible. In 1855, de Gamond had submitted the design of a 33 km long double-track railway tunnel, which should lie up to 75 m below the sea floor. Political differences prevented the implementation of the project.

British fears of the consequences of a tunnel connection around 1885 in satire form: General Wolseley , one of the fiercest opponents of a land connection with France, flees from the Gallic rooster on a lion .

In 1867 the British engineers John Hawkshaw and William Low presented the design for a 34 km long and 100 m below sea level railway tunnel. Based on this design, the Franco-British canal tunnel company Submarine Railway Company was founded in 1872 on the initiative of Edward Watkin , and three years later it received construction permission by law. In the meantime, Hawkshaw had revised his draft based on the first available geological investigations. For safety reasons, he pleaded for a slightly curved line in harder chalk rock, which increased the length of the tunnel to 37 km. The plans were welcomed by the railway companies South Eastern Railway and London, Chatham and Dover Railway because of the connection of their stations in Dover and Folkestone. The channel tunnel company, however, stuck to the straight line by bypassing the two stations. To establish the line, further geological investigations and a. carried out by means of drilling with tunnel boring machines . 1800 m of tunnels were excavated from the French side and 1,400 m from the English side under the seabed. But as early as 1882, the English Trade Office ordered the work to be suspended, and Sir Garnet Wolseley in particular had protested violently in parliament against the project.

Channel Tubular Railway Preliminary Company profit participation certificate dated May 19, 1892, signed by Edward James Reed

At the suggestion of the entrepreneur Sir EJ Reed , “The Channel Tubular Railway Preliminary Company” was founded in London in 1892, a company with a capital of 40,000 pounds sterling, whose capital requirements were to be met by issuing 250,000 participation certificates (Parts de Fondateurs) . The company planned, under the direction of Sir EJ Reed, the construction of a rail tunnel through the canal, through which the travelers should get to their destination faster than was possible with a ship crossing. The project failed for political reasons.

From 1882 onwards, the German press also paid attention to the subject. In 1910, EM Arnold presented the tunneling and bridging of seas as a peaceful contrast to the "constant mass armaments of our modern civilized peoples against each other". Nevertheless, he considered the tunneling under the English Channel to be politically delicate:

“The French chambers of commerce have recently suggested it again. Of course, the English see in its realization a danger to the security of their country and therefore try to dismiss it as a utopia of sensationalism in France. Years ago, a French company, the Association du chemin-de-fer sous-marin entre la France et l'Angleterre , was formed to promote the company , headed by the Rothschild brothers, the French Northern Railway Company […] and other influential people . The surveys initiated by this association have so far shown that it is not just a feasible giant company, but also economic advantages of unimagined scope with the implementation of the plan. In all likelihood, the tunnel construction would be possible with a capital of 300 to 400 million francs over a period of 15 to 20 years. Bridging the canal would cost around four times that amount. "

- EM Arnold : Magazine Deutscher Hausschatz 1910

Numerous other plans, ideas and concepts followed as to how and where a tunnel from France to Great Britain could be built. The idea of ​​building a bridge instead of a tunnel was also discussed in the meantime, but these ideas could not be realized either.

In 1955 the British Ministry of Defense declared that from a military point of view there were no longer any objections to a tunnel. In 1957 the Channel Tunnel Working Group was formed. In July 1960 a study group suggested building two tunnels for the railroad and an additional service tunnel. The project should be privately financed.

In 1963 the basic technical parameters of the tunnel were established. Two different lines were developed for a design as a sunken tube and a drilled tunnel. In 1965, construction costs of 1.8 billion DM and an annual volume of 3.5 to 4 million people and one million motor vehicles were expected immediately after its completion. At times a bridge variant was also proposed.

In mid-1971, the governments of the two countries commissioned the preparation of a final study for the construction of a canal tunnel. The study was due to be submitted in 1973, and completion of the tunnel was expected in 1978 at the earliest. In 1973 the UK (Prime Minister Edward Heath ) and France (President Georges Pompidou ) signed an agreement on such a project, but in 1975 the plans were postponed because of the oil crisis .

planning

In 1984 the idea of ​​connecting Great Britain to the mainland was taken up again, with a total of five plans with various combinations of tunnels, dams and suspension bridges being presented, e.g. B. the EuroRoute. Ultimately, the British and French governments opted for the privately financed construction and maintenance of the Eurotunnel. In March 1985 the tender for the tunnel project was issued. The British-French consortium “The Channel Tunnel Group Ltd / France-Manche SA” was awarded the contract. Of the four offers received, the plan that came closest to the 1973 plan was selected and announced on January 20, 1986. The treaty was signed by the two governments in Canterbury , Kent on February 12, 1986 and ratified in 1987 .

In 1986 the British and French governments decided to design the tunnel as a pure rail traffic tunnel. With this, various variants of road tunnels were finally put aside.

The planned route of the tunnel should run from Calais to Dover - a route that is longer than the 33 km of the shortest possible English Channel crossing. The tunnel should run in and follow a single layer of chalk, which would go deeper than previous attempts. As a result, the tunnel lies around 40 m below the seabed for long stretches of the way, with the southern section being deeper than the north.

On December 14, 1987, Defense Minister André Giraud for France and George Younger for Great Britain signed an agreement in which the joint defense of the tunnel under the English Channel in the event of war was agreed. At the same time, plans were agreed for a strategic use of the tunnel in the event of tension and conflict, the details of which have not been made public.

Construction and commissioning

Tunnel guidance in longitudinal section
Participating German companies Order value in
pounds (1990)
Karl-H. Mühlhäuser , Michelstadt 14.87 million
Hoesch Export , Dortmund 10.89 million
Buderus Bau- und Abwassertechnik, Wetzlar 10.85 million
Schöma , Diepholz 07.45 million
Mannesmann Demag , Duisburg 00.82 million
MAN Gutehoffnungshütte , Oberhausen 00.56 million
Thyssen Stahlunion , Düsseldorf 00.31 million

At the insistence of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher , the tunnel was built without government subsidies. On December 15, 1987, drilling began on the British side, and on September 28, 1988, work began in France. On December 1, 1990, the bottom of the canal was punctured - 15.6 km from France, 22.3 km from Great Britain.

Before the actual construction, test drillings were carried out at twelve locations in the canal using drilling rigs in 1986 and 1987 in order to obtain information about the condition of the soil. Together with hundreds of bores that were made during the failed attempts in previous decades to dig a tunnel, this resulted in a meaningful picture. Preparations for the failed attempts also had to be removed, including a tunnel boring machine (TBM) that had been left behind.

The construction of the tunnel took 15,000 workers over seven years, with the three tubes (two for the later railway line and a service tunnel) being driven simultaneously from both sides. The main contractor for the construction was a British-French construction consortium. The engineers used eleven large tunnel boring machines (TBM), including those made by Mitsubishi and Robbins . TBMs are mobile excavation factories that combine the drilling, removal of material and the process of supporting the soft and permeable tunnel walls with segments . A 65 meter deep shaft was dug near Sangatte in France for tunneling . All French tunnel boring machines bored from here: three TBMs bored the tunnels under the canal and two bored inland to the future terminal. After the southern main tunnel had been drilled on the landside, the TBM was turned in front of the tunnel portal and also drilled the northern main tunnel. It was the only TBM in the project that was used twice. On the English side, a tunnel was driven under the sea from the artificial plateau in front of Shakespeare Cliff between Dover and Folkestone using the new Austrian tunneling method and a large chamber was built there, from where all the TBMs also started, three each inland and three below Through the English Channel towards France. The landside tunnel boring machines arrived in so-called receiving chambers about two kilometers from the terminal. For nature conservation reasons, the resulting tubes were extended to directly in front of the terminal by open-cut tunnels that later disappeared under the surface and a short distance using the new Austrian tunneling method . In order to relieve the pressure of the air in front of passing trains, shafts between the main tunnel tubes were driven through the rock at regular intervals in the entire tunnel system. The cross tunnels were created in a similar way. Two large transfer points, where the trains can change the tunnel tubes, were driven underground from the service tunnel before the TBMs of the main tubes arrived there and continued to drill from there. After the British and French tunnel boring machines approached, the three British tunnel boring machines were diverted into the rock, left there and filled with concrete, while the French bored the remaining tunnel and then dismantled it. The service tunnel was the first to be penetrated. At the same time as the tunnel, the terminals, connections for the motorways and railways on both sides of the canal were built. On the English side, almost four million cubic meters of marl limestone were excavated, a large part of which was dumped into the sea below the Shakespeare cliff to gain 36 hectares of land. The resulting recreation park Samphire Hoe is owned by Getlink.

Eleven workers were killed in the process.

Cross-section through the tunnel system

The Channel Tunnel consists of three parallel tunnels: two single-track main tunnels (diameter 7.6 m) at a distance of about 30 m, in which the trains travel north and south, and in between a smaller two-lane service tunnel (diameter 4.8 m).

This service tunnel, which is used by narrow road vehicles, is connected to the main tunnels by cross passages at regular intervals (approximately every 375 m). It serves four main purposes: On the one hand, it is used to evacuate the two tunnel tubes in the event of an accident. In addition to the 38 km long submarine tunnel section in the world, the assessment of the possible consequences of the accident also included the large extent of damage due to the many trains running in the tunnel at the same time (up to twelve trains per tube can run at the same time). Another reason lies in the public debate that had developed in the planning phase about safety in the tunnel (also in comparison to ferry traffic) and which had found a strong argument for the safety of the tunnel in the third tunnel. The fourth reason given is the extent of damage caused by a fire in the tunnel. The rescue concept provides for passengers to be brought to the surface within 90 minutes. For this purpose, a train can be brought in via the second tube. The service tunnel is operated with overpressure to prevent smoke from entering. Last but not least, it serves maintenance and rescue vehicles as access to the driving tunnels and takes u. a. the water supply for the fire fighting systems. Temporary plans to build an artificial island in the English Channel for an emergency exit from the tunnel were later rejected.

The two underwater crossing halls are 7 km from Shakespeare Cliff on the British coast and 12 km from Sangatte on the French side .

On December 1, 1990, the two tunnel construction teams met where one of the “crossing halls” is today, in which the trains can be diverted from one main tube to the other. For the first time since the end of the last ice age over 13,000 years ago, it was possible to go from mainland Europe to Great Britain with dry feet. Thanks to the use of laser measurement during tunnel construction , the two tubes met with a deviation of just 35 cm in the horizontal and 6 cm in the vertical. A deviation of a maximum of 250 cm had been taken into account in the planning.

On June 20, 1993, the first test train reached Great Britain through the Eurotunnel. The tunnel was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II and the French President François Mitterrand in a solemn ceremony on May 6, 1994. The first freight train ran through the tunnel on June 1, 1994. The train service with passengers began on November 14, 1994.

At 15 billion euros, the construction costs were twice as high as originally planned.

business

From the end of 1998 DB Cargo and EWS offered a daily express train connection between Cologne-Gremberg and Wembley through the tunnel.

In 1999 truck traffic through the tunnel reached a market share of 46% of total truck traffic between the UK and France.

In 2002 the number of cars transported fell by eight percent year-on-year to 2.3 million, the number of trucks transported rose by four percent to 1.2 million. The operating company's turnover rose by two percent to 860 million euros.

At a shareholders' meeting in spring 2004, almost 2000 mostly French small shareholders overthrew the management and installed a new top management. At 1.89 billion euros, the operating company reported a loss twice the amount of sales in the year under review. The losses came mainly from interest payments for the roughly nine billion euros in debt. At the end of 2005, the company announced that it would cut 900 of the 3200 jobs by June 2006.

Due to liquidity problems, trading in shares in the operating company was suspended on May 12, 2006. Since August 2, 2006 there has been creditor protection for the operating company. Stock trading only resumed on March 28, 2007.

The track price for the use of the tunnel (for an ICE 3 double traction) should be around 100 euros per train kilometer. Another source gives the variable costs per train kilometer at 322 euros. As part of a special program, the volume of freight traffic should be doubled to at least 5000 trains per year by 2018 (as of 2014). Among other things, the train path prices were reduced by a quarter on most nights (11pm to 7am).

In September 2016, after six years of preparation and costs of 48 million euros, a GSM-R network went into operation in the tunnel. The Eurotunnel and the connecting LGV Nord are to be equipped with ETCS by 2025 , the High Speed ​​1 in Great Britain in 2032.

Accidents / breakdowns

The following accidents or breakdowns reported in the press occurred in or at the Eurotunnel:

  • On November 18, 1996, a shuttle caught fire. The train , occupied by 34 passengers, could be evacuated through the service tunnel. The passengers were uninjured (according to another source, three train attendants and five passengers suffered, in some cases, severe smoke poisoning ). The affected tunnel section was subsequently closed for seven months. There was property damage amounting to 250 million euros.
  • As a result of salt deposits on the contact lines at the tunnel entrance in Calais, traffic through the tunnel was interrupted from October 28th to 30th, 2002.
  • In August 2006, the tunnel was closed for several hours after the engine of a truck carried on the train caught fire.
  • An accident occurred on September 11, 2008 at around 3:55 pm. The fire of a truck on a train in the direction of Calais led to the train stop 11 km before the exit on the French side. The fire could only be extinguished by the fire brigade after 20 hours. 32 people, mostly truck drivers, were brought from the train to safety. 14 of them suffered injuries in the form of light smoke inhalation. The French forces were supported by several vehicles from Great Britain. The tunnel was closed to all train traffic until September 13, as the corresponding area had to be cleared. On September 14, 2008, reduced operations could then begin in the tube that was not affected by the fire. The tube affected by the fire remained completely closed for several weeks. The last third of this tube was reopened on February 9, 2009.
  • On December 18, 2009, four Eurostar trains with a total of over 2000 passengers got stuck in the tunnel. The large temperature difference between the cold air in northern France and the warm air in the tunnel probably led to the formation of condensation , which damaged the electronics of the power cars. On the morning of December 19, two of the trains were able to continue their journey in the direction of London with the assistance of diesel locomotives , the passengers of the third train were brought to Folkestone by shuttle train, while the passengers of the fourth train were also taken to a train station on the French side by shuttle train were saved. People were not harmed in the incident. As a result of the incidents, Eurostar operations in the Eurotunnel were suspended for several days in order to investigate the causes and take countermeasures.
  • On July 7, 2014, a car train to France got stuck in the tunnel. Hundreds of passengers were brought to safety through another tunnel tube.

outlook

In preparation for possible direct connections to London by DB Fernverkehr , an ICE 3 completed test drives in the Eurotunnel on the night of October 17, 2010. On June 14, 2013, Eurotunnel granted Deutsche Bahn permission to pass through. In 2010, Deutsche Bahn reckoned with one million travelers per year. Commercial traffic should start at the end of 2016. In July 2015 it was announced that the project had been postponed. This was confirmed again in March 2017.

In 2013, 43% of the tunnel capacity was unused. The European Commission wants to halve the user fees for passenger services and freight, which should improve occupancy.

facts and figures

The tunnel is 50 km long, 38 km of which are submarine. The average depth is 40 m below the sea floor. At its deepest point, the tunnel reaches 75 m below the sea floor. Since May 1994, the tunnel has made it possible to transport people and vehicles by rail. Every year almost twenty million passengers use the tunnel with a travel time of 35 minutes, of which 20 minutes are in the tunnel.

The American Society of Civil Engineers has chosen the tunnel as one of the modern seven wonders of the world .

Economical meaning

financing

The construction costs, financed without state aid at Margaret Thatcher's insistence, which exceeded the originally planned costs by more than 100%, cannot be repaid from the operation.

In 1984 a public company was established in Great Britain for the promotion and future support of the tunnel; In 1985 an analog company followed in France. In February 1986, the two countries signed a state treaty in which the guidelines for private financing of the tunnel construction project were laid down. Building on this, the two countries granted a concession to build and operate the tunnel. A group of around 200 banks granted a loan of five billion pounds for the construction of the tunnel in 1987. In the same year the two stock corporations were combined to form a partnership under English law; Profits from the project should be divided equally between the two companies.

The shares of the operator of the rail tunnel under the English Channel started in 1987 for 35 francs (5.34 euros) on the stock exchange. The number of passengers also fell far short of the original plan at less than 60%. After a high of 19.51 euros in 1989, the share fell.

At the end of November 1997, the company's 174 creditor banks agreed to reschedule the Eurotunnel operating company. The shareholders had previously voted for the plans. As part of the rescheduling, the governments of France and Great Britain extended the license of the operating company until 2086, with 40% of the profits being transferred to the state budgets during the extended period.

On February 9, 2004, Eurotunnel reported a net loss for 2003 of almost 1.9 billion euros due to major depreciation.

In 2004 the company achieved a turnover of 789 million euros and a loss of 810 million euros. On May 31, 2006, the company announced that the creditors would waive 54 percent of their claims of nine billion euros. Without the rescheduling, the company would have had to file for bankruptcy in the first half of 2007. The share was suspended from trading from May 12, 2006 to March 28, 2007.

In the second half of 2006, the Paris Commercial Court granted the heavily indebted operating company bankruptcy protection and thus saved it from bankruptcy. As a result, the scope for the high-deficit company became narrow again. By May 15, 2007, around 500,000 shareholders were able to exchange their shares for shares in the successor company Groupe Eurotunnel (now Getlink). A debt relief plan is associated with the restructuring, which has more than halved the loan burden to 4.16 billion euros. However, if the project had not been implemented as planned, the old British-French Eurotunnel company - with a debt of 9 billion euros - would have had to file for bankruptcy. The success of the share swap was expected by the banks, since otherwise the shareholders would have had to expect a total loss.

For 2007, the operating company, which has a concession to use the tunnel until 2086, was able to report a profit of one million euros for the first time. In the 1998 financial year, a net profit of 64 million pounds could be reported due to one-off effects following a rescheduling.

The dividend for 2008 was 4 cents with a net profit of 40 million euros.

In the 2012 financial year, the Eurotunnel Group generated a profit of 34 million euros. Compared to the previous year, the profit had tripled. The number of truck transports rose by 16 percent to almost 1.5 million, and the number of passengers rose by 2 percent to almost 10 million.

business

The tunnel is operated by the public company Getlink (formerly Groupe Eurotunnel). Four types of trains run through the tunnel, the two shuttle systems of which are operated by the Eurotunnel company.

Le-Shuttle loading truck
Interior view of a shuttle car
  • Eurotunnel Shuttle , also called Le Shuttle , are trains that transport cars , buses and motorcycles between Coquelles (Calais) and Folkestone. The trains consist of loading and transport wagons with a significantly larger cross-section than conventional railroad vehicles and are hauled by a six-axle electric locomotive at each end . To avoid changes of direction of travel, there are turning loops for these trains at both end points. The road vehicles drive into one or two-story locked transport vehicles. The passengers stay in or with their vehicle and are allowed to walk around. Toilets are available in every third car. The actual travel time is 35 minutes, the entire crossing (motorway exit Calais - motorway entry Folkestone) a good 90 minutes. The shuttle is so since the retirement of hovercraft from Calais to Dover in 2000, the fastest connection by car to the island.
  • “Freight shuttle trains” for trucks. The drivers travel in separate coaches.
  • Conventional freight trains. These were initially only offered by DB Schenker Rail (UK) Ltd (formerly EWS ). From March 2009, regular freight trains operated by another provider, the SNCF subsidiary Freight Europe , ran through the Channel Tunnel (as of May 2009).

At the time of the commissioning of the Eurotunnel there was only one high-speed line on the French side , the LGV Nord . The Eurostar trains from France and Belgium traveled here at up to 300 km / h from the start. On the English side in the county of Kent, the existing route network was used, which allows speeds of up to 160 km / h. Since September 4, 2007, there has also been a continuous high-speed line between the tunnel and London on the British side, the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), now called High Speed ​​One (HS1), which is partially financed by the British government . Its first section between the Eurotunnel and Fawkham Junction went into operation in September 2003. Trains travel at speeds of up to 160 km / h inside the tunnel.

The Eurotunnel connects the route networks of mainland Europe with that in Great Britain, but until 2007, due to the smaller British clearance profile , free train traffic was only possible with vehicles that correspond to the British vehicle boundary line (so-called ferry boat cars). However, the new HS1 line is designed in the broader continental European clearance profile, the tunnel and its connecting routes to the »Le Shuttle« loading stations have a particularly large special clearance profile. The existing lines in Kent are electrified with 750 V DC voltage and a side busbar painted from above based on the system of the former Southern Railway . The HS1 has received the overhead line with 25 kV at 50 Hz, which is also used in France and in the Eurotunnel. Since the HS1 was only opened in 2007, the Eurostar trains were designed for the British clearance profile and provided with additional fold-out steps on the doors that can be adjusted to the different platform heights and distances. For end-to-end connections, the trains also had to be designed for three different electricity and four train control systems. Therefore they were equipped with pantographs for the overhead line as well as for the conductor rails. The current rail pantographs were dismantled after the high-speed line went into operation.

In the last few years the importance of the tunnel for traffic has increased, as the train traffic has been able to assert itself better against ferries and low-cost airlines by expanding the section between the tunnel and London.

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For the passage through the tunnel, passenger trains must, among other things, be able to start on the 11 ‰ gradients with 50% traction power and, under fire conditions, be able to continue at least 30 minutes at 100 km / h or 15 minutes at 80 km / h . The requirement that trains can also be separated in an emergency no longer appears in the safety regulations (as of April 2020), as do the requirements for power heads and locomotives or regulations for a minimum length of 375 meters.

In 2010, tests were completed on a new water mist-based fire suppression system to be installed in the tunnel.

Political importance

Asylum seekers who were hoping for better asylum prospects in Great Britain than in France often used the tunnel to illegally enter Great Britain. Few tried to walk through the tunnel or to hold onto the trains themselves. Most hid in cargo containers or on trucks that crossed the tunnel. Since the European Commission made France aware in 2002 of the discrepancy between the free transfer of goods in the European Union and the constant delay in searching freight trains at the loading station due to its poor security, a double fence has been built for £ 5 million. This measure drastically reduced the number of successful refugees. In early 2003, the British government convinced the French authorities to close the controversial asylum seekers camp near Sangatte , which had often been the starting point for such actions by asylum seekers. But this only shifted the problem of hopeful asylum seekers to camps outside the city.

On July 4, 2015, there were delays in tunnel operations after around 150 migrants had penetrated the cordoned-off area at the tunnel entrance. According to the Eurotunnel company, which operates this route, it thwarted 37,000 escape attempts between January and June 2015. On the night of Tuesday July 29, a refugee aged between 25 and 30 was found dead when 1,500 to 2,000 migrants attempted to penetrate the entrance of the link under the English Channel to enter England. It is estimated that in August 2016 up to 9,000 migrants were waiting in a wild camp, the Calais jungle , for a chance to come to Great Britain.

Brexit

During the transition phase, in which negotiations between the European Union and Great Britain are being conducted and which will run until the end of 2020, there should be no changes in the use of the Eurotunnel. Passengers can travel with their identity card and do not need a visa. For the time after the transition phase, there could be delays and backlogs around the tunnel. This was shown by a slow strike with which French customs officials simulated Brexit in 2019.

Importance in the media

The French film pioneer Georges Méliès was the first to take up the idea of ​​tunneling under the English Channel with a railroad connection on film and in 1907 he created the film Le Tunnel sous la Manche ou le Cauchemar franco-anglais .

In the 1996 film Mission: Impossible by Brian De Palma , Tom Cruise is chased into the tunnel by a helicopter while hanging from a train. However, these computer-generated scenes are unrealistic (since the trains are supplied with power via overhead lines and even a small helicopter rotor would not fit into the tunnel) and do not show the Eurotunnel. In addition, no TGV Atlantique run through the tunnel .

The British-French television series The Tunnel - Murder Knows No Borders takes place on both sides of the Eurotunnel, and the Eurotunnel is always a central part of the plot. The first season begins with a body found in the supply tunnel exactly on the border between France and Great Britain.

Trivia

As the railways in France and Great Britain operate on the left, there is no need to change sides.

At the beginning of June 2014, the British cyclist Chris Froome cycled through the service tunnel from England to France. The 2013 Tour de France winner needed 55 minutes for the almost 54 km long route, which corresponds to an average speed of almost 60 km / h.

literature

  • Friedhelm Ernst: "Eurostar" and "Eurotunnel". In: Railway courier. 29, No. 272, 1995, ISSN  0170-5288 , pp. 84-86.
  • Lionel Bender: The tunnel through the canal. Tessloff Verlag, Nuremberg 1990, ISBN 3-7886-0495-6 (engineers at work)

Web links

Wiktionary: Eurotunnel  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations
Commons : Eurotunnel  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Eurotunnel  - Sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.euronews.net/2011/05/05/back-in-the-day-channel-tunnel-links-britain-and-france/
  2. ↑ Eurotunnel rebrands as Getlink , International Rail Journal, November 20, 2017 (English)
  3. ^ A b c d Alfred Pletsch, Hansjörg Dongus, Henrik Uterweede: France - geography, history, economy, politics . In: Werner Storkebaum (Ed.): Scientific country customers . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt, Darmstadt 1997, ISBN 3-534-11691-7 , p. 231 f . (B. Sasso: Le tunnel sous la Manche , Paris 1994, page 8, is given as the source for Thomé de Gamond ).
  4. ↑ Tube for life . In: Der Spiegel . No. 47 , 1987 ( online - November 16, 1987 , at the beginning of December, drilling work on the Canal Tunnel, the largest private construction project in European history.
  5. ^ A b Victor von Röll : Encyclopedia of the Railway System. Volume 1, Berlin / Vienna 1912–1923, p. 106 (keyword “English Channel Tunnel”).
  6. ^ Submarine Continental Eisenbahngesellschaft , Centralblatt der Bauverwaltung , March 18, 1882, p. 96, accessed on December 9, 2012
  7. ^ German house treasure. Vol. 36, issue 1/1910, p. 16.
  8. ^ Frankfurter Zeitung: From the world and life - Daring construction plans. Number 330 of July 2, 1934, p. 4.
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  15. ↑ EUROTUNNEL: Breakthrough for Europe. Speculative connection , Wirtschaftswoche of November 2, 1990
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  40. ↑ Weather chaos: the cold will stop Eurostar indefinitely , focus.de, December 20, 2009.
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  58. ↑ E urotunnel to pay first dividend . bbc.com, March 4, 2009
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