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What was the reason for several water inlets in the Lötschberg base tunnel? The answer dates back to 2001.
The Bern-based railway company BLS has been fighting against water entering the Lötschberg base tunnel since February. For this reason, part of the east tube had to be temporarily closed three times. Until now, engineers could only guess what the cause was. The TX Group newspapers write that the puzzle is already solved.
The water problem already started when the tunnel was built in 2001. At that time, a probe drilling into a karst area containing water found a spring with a lot of water.
Spring water is drained into the tunnel
Instead of closing the source and draining the water out of the tunnel, they opted for a different variant: construction specialists drained the spring water with a pipeline inside the outermost layer of the tunnel. The entry of water now occurred because this line was blocked by mud.
Newspapers refer to an article in the English magazine “Tunneltalk”. Stefan Irngartinger is quoted there, he is the Alptransit BLS project manager. ETH professor Heinz Ehrbar is also quoted as saying that the procedure at that time was questionable. It is extremely risky to drain the water into the tunnel tube.
The BLS declines to comment on Radio SRF’s request. Full information will be available at a media event next Tuesday.