Channel Tunneling WW1

[atom12]

   Happy Diggin'

Hope your find some more substantial evidence to reveal to us.

Anne

[bodger]

A Channel tunnell, c1914/18, with the technology of the time it would have taken 4/5 years, ie the Woodhead tunnel, 3 miles took 2 years in the 1950s . bodger

[Bill749]

Miners were used to tunnel under the enemy front line during WW1, but I can't imagine anyone attempting to dig a tunnel under the Channel during wartime.

The original plans to dig a tunnel were abandoned because of the Napoleonic wars - they were worried that the enemy might use it to invade.

Apart from anything else, with the technology available to them at the time, the war would have been over and WW2 looming on the horizon before the tunnel was finished!

Bill

[Gadget]

Could I just reinforce what I keep saying - it was PLANNING a Channel Tunnel not digging it. My cousin was a mining surveyor.

Gadget

[Gardener]

A Channel tunnell, c1914/18, with the technology of the time it would have taken 4/5 years, ie the Woodhead tunnel, 3 miles took 2 years in the 1950s . bodger

I'm not sure that comparison works for me. Isn't the Woodhead tunnel mostly in Millstone grit? That is a good bit harder than the chalk which it was proposed to tunnel for the channel.
I bet in the war there were investigations into all sorts of things which were not found to be practical. Arguing that the war would be over before it was finished only works because we know when the war finished!
I wonder if your cousin was a member of some professional body/club Gadget? Would there have been something written when he died? The Geol Soc of London does that and I should think there must be more societies that did.

[meles]

That's a good observation, Gardener.

And Gadget, if there is a Geological Society link, do let me know, as I work only a few hundred yards from their building and would be happy to pop in one lunchtime.

meles

[kerryb]

Hi everyone

I PM'ed Gadget about this yesterday, on the second series of Coast there was a piece on this very subject.  If anyone has the DVDs of the series perhaps you would like to rewatch it.

The delectable Neil Oliver investigated and actually visited the tunnel that was started from the Dover side in the 1880s which was built some way and then stopped. 

Presumably this is the tunnel that was reinvestigated in the WW1 period. Incidentally as Gardener says chalk is extremely easy to tunnel and the Coast website has an illustration of the Chalk in the SE - North and South Downs that go under the channel and come up again in France exactly today where the tunnel is.

Kerry

[Gadget]

I've been up since 3 am watching a game so have not really had time to digest everything that has been said on this thread this morning. I'll have a good read through again and certainly take up the positive suggestions.

Thank you

Gadget

[atom12]

Hi

According to the DPJ of July, 1917, the tunnel would take 3 - 4 years to build, at a cost of £16,000,000, and a length of 21 miles.  Presumably the digging would be from both ends of the channel.

Anne