Surat Metro’s TBM Narmada Records Final Breakthrough at Railway Station
August 2024 is the gift that keeps giving! Besides tunnel breakthroughs in Mumbai, Delhi, Agra and Chennai, there was another breakthrough that took place in Surat as the month came to an end.
Gulermak – Sam India Builtwell JV on Friday night celebrated tunnel boring machine (TBM) S78’s final breakthrough at Surat Railway Station of Surat Metro Phase 1 project’s 22.77 km Line-1 (Sarthana – Dream City).
Nicknamed TBM Narmada, this was S78’s third & final tunnel breakthrough, and overall the fifth & penultimate breakthrough for 3.46 km Package CS2 / UG1 connecting Kapodra – Surat Railway Station.
S78 is a refurbished Terratec earth pressure balance (EPB) machine and had completed its first assignment in January 2024 to build a 1.5 km tunnel for the down-line from Kapodra to Labheshwar Chowk. That breakthrough was “hidden” as soil excavation was still underway.
The machine then mined through Labheshwar Chowk Station’s box, bored a roughly 600m tunnel and recorded its second breakthrough at Central Warehouse’s eastern shaft in 3 months. For its third assignment which ended on Friday, the machine built a 388m tunnel from Central Warehouse to Surat Railway Station.
Gujarat Metro Rail Corporation (GMRC) had awarded 3.46 km Package CS2 / UG1’s construction contract to Gulermak – Sam India JV in March 2021.
Besides boring 6 tunnels (3 twin tunnels) by S78 (Narmada) and S94 (Tapi), their scope also includes the construction of 3 stations at Kapodra, Labheshwar Chowk and Central Warehouse.
S78’s job is now done! It remains unconfirmed, but I hear Gulermak will ship it off to their new job-site in Cluj, Romania to build Cluj-Napoca Metro‘s Line-1 tunnels.
Update: Gulermak will be deploying 2 CRCHI machines instead. See a video here.
TBM S94 (Tapi) is trailing behind S78 by about 2 months and arrived at Central Warehouse in July 2024. Unless something goes terribly wrong, we should hear about its 3rd breakthrough, essentially the 6th & final one for Package CS2 / UG1, sometime in late October – early November. Stay tuned!
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– TMRG
Wow! I wasn’t aware that our companies are involved in construction of metro projects across the world. I thought it was only dmrc involved in consulting works.
Makes sense though, since they do so much tunneling here, they can use that experience elsewhere.
Gulermak is Turkish
Congratulations to the Surat Metro team for achieving this significant milestone with the final breakthrough of TBM S78 at the station. This achievement is a testament to the commitment and competence of everyone involved in this ambitious project.