HS2 has completed a set of major lifts of Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) components at its Victoria Road Crossover Box site, in Ealing, west London. The TBMs will be used to dig the eastern half of the Northolt Tunnel – which will ultimately be used to take the new high-speed Read more…
Second tunnel bore under Long Itchington Wood in Warwickshire
HS2 Ltd’s tunnel boring machine (TBM) has launched for its second one-mile tunnel bore under Long Itchington Wood in Warwickshire, marking the next big milestone for construction on the northern section of Phase One of the HS2 project. The 125 metre-long TBM, nicknamed ‘Dorothy’, is boring the tunnel that preserves Read more…
First tunnelling breakthrough on HS2
HS2 is celebrating the very first tunnelling breakthrough on its one-mile dig under Long Itchington Wood in Warwickshire. The 2,000-tonne 125m long Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) named ‘Dorothy’ – after Dorothy Hodgkin, who in 1964 became the first British woman to win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, started its journey at the tunnel’s North Portal in December 2021, broke through the wall of the reception box at the South Portal site on Friday 22 July 2022. Nearly 400 people working for HS2’s main works civils contractor Balfour Beatty VINCI (BBV JV) have delivered this important milestone on the HS2 project.