By Ashley Karen
A railway tunnel in Luxembourg that witnessed a considerable rockfall in 2022 will reopen in August following work to repair it.
The incident happened inside the Schieburg tunnel between Kautenbach and Wilwerwiltz during a scheduled structure closure in August 2022. Following the rockfall, the tunnel was closed to rail traffic on the northern line.
CFL, the national railway company of Luxembourg, and eight other contractors and designers have been operating to fix the tunnel and carry out stabilization work on the area of rock located above the tunnel.
CFL and its team have drilled 49 boreholes with a depth of 50m – 75m and finished 45 concrete injections, amounting to 414m³ of concrete, since January 2023.
In addition, to secure the injected areas in the rock, the team has installed 18 rock anchors, including ten anchors with a length of almost 80m positioned from the outside and eight anchors set from the inside of the tunnel.
With stabilization works now ended, CFL will start the next stage of work to fix the tunnel. This stage comprises the removal of the rock pile inside the tunnel, the installation of the permanent stability structure, and the repair of railway tracks and electric traction installations inside the tunnel.
As predicted, depending on the advancement of the current works, CFL will reopen the tunnel on 5 August.
The tunnel was said to open in April of this year; nevertheless, its reopening was postponed due to a cavity in the rock above the tunnel that the team was infilling was discovered to be larger than predicted. In April, the team also found an area of land subsidence above the tunnel, which has problematized the repair works.
While it works to fix the tunnel, the railway company thanked its customers for their patience. It also continued that this work’s completion is critical to secure the safe operation of the railway line.
