HS2 lifts third giant tunnelling machine in London after 3.4-mile underground journey

HS2 lifts Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) ‘Emily’ from below ground at the Green Park Way site in Greenford, West London

On Saturday 26th July, the team working on the HS2 project lifted the TBM's 9.11metre diameter cutterhead, front and middle shield, weighing 880 tonnes, using a large gantry crane. The tunnelling machine concluded its 3.4-mile journey from Victoria Road in Ealing in June, arriving in an underground reception chamber. TBM Emily excavated 775,000 tonnes of London Clay and installed 17,514 concrete tunnel segments.

In keeping with tradition, the machine was given a female name after Emily Sophia Taylor who helped establish the Perivale Maternity Hospital in 1937 before becoming Ealing’s first female mayor in 1938.

TBM Emily is one of four machines used to construct part of the Northolt Tunnel – an 8.4-mile tunnel which will take HS2 trains from Old Oak Common Station to the outskirts of the capital. The fourth machine finished the excavation of the tunnel earlier this month and will be removed later this summer.