Another milestone has been reached in the construction of the Ibbenbüren mine water channel: after 3,867 metres and 2,959 segment rings built, tunnel boring machine "Tisa" reached the target cavern at Shaft 1 on the former mine site of RAG Aktiengesellschaft, Ibbenbüren division, at 2:20 p.m. on 24 February 2025.
A team from the Tunnel Ibbenbüren consortium completed this challenging task of driving the east side of the "Deina" tunnel around the clock in continuous operation.
Since the sister machine "Barbara" started driving the west side of the "Miriam" tunnel on 7 December 2022, a total of 5,444 segment rings, each with 6 stones and an internal diameter of 3,600 mm, have been installed over a total of 7,108 metres.
During the excavation, man and machine overcame a wide variety of challenges, such as the changing geological and hydrogeological nature of the rock in a subsoil characterised by mining, working in very confined conditions and under high technical requirements.
The Tunnel Ibbenbüren consortium and the parent companies of the partners Wayss & Freytag Ingenieurbau AG and Ed. Züblin AG are delighted to have reached this milestone.
In the coming weeks, the tunnelling system will be dismantled and the tunnelling equipment on the construction site will be cleared so that work can begin on the next phase of the eastern tunnel lining with prefabricated channel elements.
