This article was taken from the July 2014 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.
Before you dig 230 kilometres worth of tunnel, it's a good idea to do some recon. Shown above is the six-metre-wide exploratory tunnel of the Brenner Base Tunnel, an €8.6 billion (£7 billion) railway project that will link Austria and Italy, and eventually Helsinki and Malta. "This exploratory tunnel is excavated to obtain detailed geological and hydrogeological information," says Konrad Bergmeister, CEO of the EU-funded project. The data obtained from the initial excavation is being used to modify construction approaches and understand the risks. Work on the two main tunnels, each eight metres wide, 55km long and up to 1.6km underground, will start in 2016. When they're finished, it will be the second longest tunnel in the world, spanning two tectonic plates.