Source: Wired.com
Author: Jack Stewart
Date: April 5th, 2017

Bertha has broken through. After nearly four years underground, Seattle's beleaguered boring behemoth clawed its way into daylight yesterday, leaving a 1.7-mile tunnel behind it. And now that its job is done, workers can at last move an aging, potentially dangerous stretch of elevated highway below the surface, and build a new public space on Seattle's waterfront in its place.
在西雅圖地下工作近四年后，飽受爭(zhēng)議的巨型挖掘機(jī) Bertha 在昨天終于重見(jiàn)天日，完成了 1.7 英里隧道的挖掘工作。此后，西雅圖海濱一段年久失修、存有安全隱患的高架路將移入這段隧道，這一地段也將被改造成海濱公共空間。

The tunneling machine, named for former Seattle mayor Bertha Knight Landes, boasts a 57-foot diameter and measures 325 feet long. After dropping into a pit in July 2013, it started digging the tunnel that will hold the replacement for the Alaskan Way Viaduct, an elevated highway that was partly demolished after being damaged by a 2001 earthquake.
這臺(tái)挖掘機(jī)以西雅圖前市長(zhǎng) Bertha Knight Landes 命名，直徑 57 英尺，長(zhǎng)達(dá) 325 英尺。Bertha 于 2013 年 7 月進(jìn)入地下，開(kāi)始挖掘。隧道建成后，將取代在 2001 年地震中部分受損的 Alaskan Way 高架路。

Bertha's job was supposed to take two and a half years, but in December 2013, disaster struck: After just 1,000 feet of work, temperature spikes inside the machine set alarm bells ringing, and Bertha had to stop. The contractor says an 8-inch steel well casing, a bit of pipe, basically, fouled the cutting tools and damaged the blades at the front. (Washington State disagrees on the cause; lawyers are fighting it out.)
Bertha 的工作原本計(jì)劃需要兩年半完成，然而在 2013 年 12 月，災(zāi)難降臨了：在僅僅推進(jìn)了 1000 英尺后，機(jī)器內(nèi)部溫度急劇升高并觸發(fā)警報(bào)，導(dǎo)致停工。承包商表示，事故原因是一個(gè)直徑 8 英寸的鋼制水井（也就是一些管道）損壞了機(jī)器前部的切割片。（州政府對(duì)此并不認(rèn)同，并派出律師以查明原因。）

Eventually engineers determined that seals on the main bearing needed replacing, and the most efficient thing to do was to dig down 120 feet to where Bertha was stuck, pull the cutting head up to the surface, and do repairs on site. That took technicians two years, but they finally sent Bertha on its way again in December 2015. And on Tuesday, it finally gnawed through the concrete wall of a newly constructed, 90 feet deep, 'disassembly pit'.
工程人員最終決定更換機(jī)器主軸的密封裝置，最優(yōu)方案則是在 Bertha 被困住的地方掘地 120 英尺，將受損切割片拉上來(lái)，進(jìn)行現(xiàn)場(chǎng)維修。該過(guò)程耗時(shí)兩年，最終成功在 2015 年 12 月重新啟動(dòng)了 Bertha 。在本周二，隨著B(niǎo)ertha 抵達(dá)一個(gè) 90 英尺深的混凝土“拆卸坑”，整個(gè)隧道至此貫通。

Bertha broke through a new concrete wall into a disassembly pit. *Copyright: Washington State Dept. of Transportation*

Now, workers will cut 7,982-ton Bertha into about hundreds of 20-ton pieces, so they can crane them out and truck them away. They'll decide if parts can be salvaged for use on other projects, or if they should be recycled. No surprise, that'll take several months. (Dismemberment beats being buried alive: After a 200-ton tunneling machine finished its work under New York City, workers abandoned it instead of hauling it back up.)
重達(dá) 7982 噸的 Bertha 在這個(gè)深坑內(nèi)將被拆卸成數(shù)百個(gè)重約 20 噸的零件，便于吊裝和運(yùn)輸。工程人員尚未決定這些零件能否用于其他類似工程，或者將它們回收處理。毫無(wú)疑問(wèn)，這一拆卸過(guò)程將會(huì)耗時(shí)數(shù)月。（在紐約市，曾有一臺(tái) 200 噸重的挖掘機(jī)，在完成使命后被棄置地下，未能“重見(jiàn)天日”。）

Engineers will cut the machine into pieces no more than 20 tonnes in weight, so that they can be removed on trucks. *Copyright: Washington State Dept. of Transportation*

This breakthrough is just the start. Now construction crews have to finish a double deck highway inside the 60-foot diameter tube, complete with lighting, ventilation, and fire detection systems. Washington State's Department of Transportation says inspectors will test more than 8,500 components over the next two years, before signing off and letting traffic through.
隧道本體的貫通僅是一個(gè)開(kāi)始。后續(xù)工程將在這個(gè)直徑達(dá) 60 英尺的隧道中修建一條雙層高速公路，以及照明、通風(fēng)、防火等配套設(shè)施。華盛頓州交通部表示，他們將在今后兩年內(nèi)，對(duì)隧道內(nèi)超過(guò) 8500 處關(guān)鍵點(diǎn)進(jìn)行檢測(cè)，隨后宣布正式通車。

Bertha's journey has been a slow one, even when compared to other boring projects. London carved 23 miles of tunnels under the city for a new Crossrail train in just three years, using eight machines. And serial entrepreneur and traffic hater, Elon Musk says he can find a better way to build tunnels, which he sees as a way to increase road capacity. He is digging a test trench outside the HQ of his company SpaceX in Los Angeles, and while he admits "We have no idea what we're doing," he says he hopes to increase the speed of tunneling by 500 to 1,000 percent. Eventually he'd like to see a network of tunnels up to 30 layers deep under cities, with traffic whizzing in three dimensions, instead of just two on the surface.
相比其他隧道工程， Bertha 可謂行動(dòng)遲緩。倫敦僅僅耗時(shí)三年、使用八臺(tái)機(jī)器，就挖掘了 23 英里的隧道。連環(huán)企業(yè)家、痛恨堵車的 Elon Musk 也表示，他將發(fā)明更優(yōu)方法來(lái)修建隧道，增加道路容量。他還在洛杉磯 SpacesX 總部外面挖了一條溝，進(jìn)行試驗(yàn)。盡管他承認(rèn)“我也不知道我們?cè)诟陕铩?，他仍然希望將掘進(jìn)速度提升 500~1000% 。他最終的愿望，是在城市之下修建多達(dá) 30 層的隧道網(wǎng)絡(luò)，將交通形式由地表的二維升級(jí)為三維。

Musk may want to look at Seattle for a reality check on the difficulties of working underground. The $2 billion Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement in Seattle is now slated to open in early 2019, fully three years behind schedule. But hey, at least there's now light at the end of the tunnel.
或許 Musk 需要來(lái)西雅圖看看，感受地下施工的種種實(shí)際困難。如今，一拖再拖的西雅圖 Alaskan Way 高架入地工程計(jì)劃于 2019 年早期竣工，這比最初計(jì)劃整整晚了三年。不過(guò)也別灰心，現(xiàn)在好歹算是有了盼頭。

main bearing 主軸承
serial entrepreneur 連環(huán)企業(yè)家

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