Calcium power. It was since 1979 that Spain and Morocco discussed the possibility of making a tunnel Under the Strait of Gibraltar that connected Europe and Africa. Those talks had fruity nothing more than the technical impossibility of eliminating the exhaust gases of cars from a long tunnel, in the planes of the time, about 14 kilometers. But now that these two countries have to host the 2030 World Cup, the idea of an exclusively railway tunnel is becoming reality. The National Company of Morocco for Studies on the Strait of Gibraltar and its Spanish counterparty (Sociedad Española de Estudios Para la communicated Fija a Través of the Estracho de Gibraltar, Secegsa), have entrusted the German company Herrenknecht, specialized in the construction of tunnel, a feasibility study. The Strait of Gibraltar is the second pass of the largest maritime traffic in the world, according to the Channel of the Channel only, where the Eurotunnel was built that connects France and the United Kingdom. Nobody questions its geostrategic value, and recent topicality only reconfirm it. Over 80 percent of basic necessities are transported by sea, but maritime traffic must cross the difficult “bottlenecks” that connect oceans, seas and continents of the planet. The Strait of Gibraltar is one of these.
It remains to be understood how a tunnel that connects the two continents can lighten the aforementioned traffic. Certainly it poses issues of great importance, considering the epochal migratory phenomenon, but also the presence of Russia in Libya, the expansion of Chinese trade and western interests in the African area. As it is thought, the submarine connection would be an opportunity for growth and development for the two sides, and above all for the development of intercontinental terrestrial transport, whose first beneficiary would be the Euro-African economic area. That’s why the Brussels commission is also pushing for its construction considering it a space of cooperation between the Union and the Maghreb.
We now come to the most technical issues. The tunnel for which the feasibility is studied would extend for 38.5 kilometers, of which 28 kilometers would run under the Strait of Gibraltar at a depth between 175 and 475 meters below sea level. It would have three galleries: two for trains and one for maintenance and safety, with various transverse joints every 340 meters. The current project plans to follow the so -called Ruta of Umbral, which goes from Punta Paloma, near the town of Tarifa in Spain, in Punta Malabata, ten kilometers from Tangier. If these two locations are the entrances and exits of the tunnel, the train route will continue joining Casablanca in Madrid in about five and a half hours (against 12 current) with intermediate stops in Tangier and Algeciras. As they said, once made, the tunnel will not be able to have a decisive impact in migratory policy.
The idea is to establish reception and sorting centers of migrants At the ends of the tunnel (and it would even seem within it), in order to give time to the respective governments to organize the reception and provide the necessary aid, from medical care to essential services. According to the Secegsa plans, the infrastructure will reflect the tunnel design under the sleeve, with two parallel tunnels with a single track for passenger trains and high -speed goods traveling in opposite directions, and the possibility of loading vehicles. One of the problems to be solved will be the seismic risk, given that the Strait of Gibraltar is located on the border between the Eurasian and African tectonic plaque. The Spanish government has invested five hundred thousand euros to rent four underwater seismometers who study the seabed of the Strait.
But the impression is that this will be only the first step. Panorama asked Anja Heckendorf, spokesman for the German company Herrenknecht, further information on the project: “What I can say, in addition to confirming that we have won the contract for the realization of the feasibility study” says Heckendorf “is that the study will go on until next summer. I point out that we do not yet have assignments to provide technology or carry out construction works “. There are no doubts about why the choice has fallen on this company:” We have 30 years of history during which our tunnels for tunnels have been used in Spanish transport projects, in the construction of a tunnel under the Bosphorus and in the underground of a maritime arm in Hong Kong “. But on the challenges in terms of technology and logistics that the Strait of Gibraltar places, Heckendorf replies: «The current resolutions presuppose a length of over 30 kilometers and a depth of several hundred meters below the sea. The feasibility study asks us: is it possible to win this challenge and with what solutions? Here, we will answer this question ». From which, it is not exaggerated to affirm it, the fate of Europe and Africa will largely depend.
