Rohtang Tunnel project faces another geological hurdle
The strategic Rohtang Tunnel project, aimed at providing all-weather road connectivity to areas bordering China, has hit another geological roadblock as the engineers are finding it difficult to excavate through the withered rocks strata.
The engineers working on the tunnel project have come across thin rock strata beneath the mighty 13,050-ft high Rohtang pass, the gateway to the tribal Lahaul and Spiti district.
“It’s just that we have come across the withered rock strata. It is further hampering excavation works," Brigadier D N Bhatt, chief engineer of the Rohtang Tunnel project, said.
“The workforce at the tunnel is only able to cut through four metres of rock these days. Earlier, we progressed at the rate of 15 to 20 metres a day," said Bhatt, explaining that it is easier to excavate through the hard rock but difficult to stabilise the overhead thin rock layers.
The country's elite Border Road Organisation (BRO) had aimed to connect the two portals of tunnel—the south portal in Dhundhi and the north portal in Sissu nullah by July this year.
The BRO engineers have already excavated 4.1 km from the south side and 3.6 km from the north side.
The total length of the tunnel is 8.8 kilometres. The work on the north portal remained suspended for six months as heavy snowfall in Rohtang cuts off the district. Rohtang pass is usually thrown open for traffic in November.
But now, it anticipates that withered rocks that has hit the progress will further delay its deadline for making the two ends of the tunnel meet .
"We had anticipated that tunnel ends will meet by July this year but it would now further delay it by two or three months," says Bhatt.
The crucial tunnel is being built in collaboration with Strabag-Afcons, a joint venture between India’s Afcons Infrastructure Limited and Austria’s Strabag SE. The foundation of the dream project—considered to be one of the engineering marvels in the country—was laid on June 28, 2010 by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.