russian: Тоннель под Амуром
russian: стройка No.4 , image = Amur_River_Tunnel_Profile.jpg , image_size = 300 , caption = Profile of Amur River Tunnel , line =

Trans-Siberian Railway The Trans-Siberian Railway (TSR; , , ) connects European Russia to the Russian Far East. Spanning a length of over , it is the longest railway line in the world. It runs from the city of Moscow in the west to the city of Vladivostok in the ea ...

, location =

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

(Imeni Telmana, JAO, and

Khabarovsk Krai Khabarovsk Krai ( rus, Хабаровский край, r=Khabarovsky kray, p=xɐˈbarəfskʲɪj kraj) is a federal subject (a krai) of Russia. It is geographically located in the Russian Far East and is a part of the Far Eastern Federal District ...

) , coordinates = , system = OAO RZhD , status = Active since 25 October 1942 , crosses =

Amur River The Amur (russian: река́ Аму́р, ), or Heilong Jiang (, "Black Dragon River", ), is the world's List of longest rivers, tenth longest river, forming the border between the Russian Far East and Northeast China, Northeastern China (Inne ...

, start = , end = , stations = , startwork = 1937 , opened = July 12, 1941 , closed = , owner = OAO RZhD , operator = OAO RZhD , traffic = Railway , character = Passenger and freight , length = , linelength = , tracklength = , notrack = single-track , gauge = ( Russian gauge) , el = , speed = , hielevation = , lowelevation = , height = , grade = , map = The Amur River Tunnel ( Russian: , during its construction — стройка No.4) is a 7200-meter-long

railroad tunnel A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube constr ...

on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, in

Khabarovsk Khabarovsk ( rus, Хабaровск, a=Хабаровск.ogg, r=Habárovsk, p=xɐˈbarəfsk) is the largest types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative centre of Khabarovsk Krai, Russia,Law #109 located from the China ...

. It was built during 1937—42 for giving an alternate route for the

Khabarovsk Bridge Khabarovsk Bridge is a road and rail bridge built in 1999. It crosses the Amur River in eastern Russia, and connects the urban-type settlement of Imeni Telmana in the Jewish Autonomous Oblast with the city of Khabarovsk in Khabarovsk Krai. Unt ...

across the

. This tunnel is the only

underwater tunnel An underwater tunnel is a tunnel which is partly or wholly constructed under the sea or a river. They are often used where building a bridge or operating a ferry link is unviable, or to provide competition or relief for existing bridges or ferry li ...

in the Russian Railroad System.ОАО РЖД
/ref> The concept of drilling a tunnel underneath the Amur River arose in connection with the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railroad. In 1913, at the exhibition of the plans , there was a drawing of the tunnel, but the choice had already been made in favor of the bridge. During the 1930s, the construction of a second track for the Trans-Siberian Railroad east of

Irkutsk Irkutsk ( ; rus, Иркутск, p=ɪrˈkutsk; Buryat language, Buryat and mn, Эрхүү, ''Erhüü'', ) is the largest city and administrative center of Irkutsk Oblast, Russia. With a population of 617,473 as of the 2010 Census, Irkutsk is ...

was undertaken. The need to build this tunnel was caused by the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in

1931 Events January * January 2 – South Dakota native Ernest Lawrence invents the cyclotron, used to accelerate particles to study nuclear physics. * January 4 – German pilot Elly Beinhorn begins her flight to Africa. * January 22 – Sir I ...

, and the loss of the Chinese Eastern Railway. Accordingly, the bridge at Khabarovsk was vulnerable to the Japanese air raids. In

1936 Events January–February * January 20 – George V of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India, dies at his Sandringham Estate. The Prince of Wales succeeds to the throne of the United Kingdom as King E ...

, because of the particular strategic importance for the country's Trans-Siberian Railroad, the

Kremlin The Kremlin ( rus, Московский Кремль, r=Moskovskiy Kreml', p=ˈmɐˈskofskʲɪj krʲemlʲ, t=Moscow Kremlin) is a fortified complex in the center of Moscow founded by the Rurik dynasty, Rurik dynasty. It is the best known of th ...

decided to build under the urging of the General Staff of the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

. The technical design of the underwater 7,200 meter-long tunnel was carried out in

1937 Events January * January 1 – Anastasio Somoza García becomes President of Nicaragua. * January 5 – Water levels begin to rise in the Ohio River in the United States, leading to the Ohio River flood of 1937, which continues into Fe ...

by the Metroproject Institute which was then in the People's Commissariat of Communications of the USSR The seven kilometer-long-railroad tunnel had been covered with five boards ??, 3627 meter-long mountain way?? (three faces) in the eastern sector, 1350 meters of open way in the western section, and an internal ?? diameter tunnel - 7400 mm for underwater. Using crushed stone, construction of houses and other surface structures carried out by railway troops. 900 experts in the primary professions and thousands of local civilian citizens worked directly in the tunnel under the Amur. About 5500 people worked only towards "construction № 4", a code name. Prisoners working in the Tunguska and in the New Stone ?? quarried

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

for buildings. The Magnitogorsk plant on the

Ural River The Ural (russian: Урал, ), known before 1775 as Yaik (russian: Яик, ba, Яйыҡ, translit=Yayıq, ; kk, Жайық, translit=Jaiyq, ), is a river flowing through Russia and Kazakhstan in the continental border between Europe and Asia ...

supplied the iron tubing to line the tunnel. Дальневосточная магистраль России / Сост. В. Ф. Буркова, В. Ф. Зуев. — Хабаровск: Частная коллекция, 1997. — Shortly prior to the

Great Patriotic War The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of conflict between the European Axis powers against the Soviet Union (USSR), Poland and other Allies, which encompassed Central Europe, Eastern Europe, Northeast Europe (Baltics), and Sout ...

, the work was nearing completion. In

1941 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January–August – 10,072 men, women and children with mental and physical disabilities are asphyxiated with carbon monoxide in a gas chamber, at Hadamar Eu ...

, after the outbreak of the war,

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...

set a time limit on completing the building of the railway. On 12 July 1941, the first train with builders on it ran through the tunnel. Regular traffic started on 25 October

1942 Events Below, the events of World War II have the "WWII" prefix. January * January 1 – WWII: The Declaration by United Nations is signed by China, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 22 other nations, in wh ...

. During 1944–45, cargo transportation for the upcoming invasion of Manchuria against Japan began. In accordance with the order of the People's Commissar of Railways Ivan Vladimirovich Kovalev of 22 May 1945 on the Far Eastern Railway to expedite the work, procedures was put in place to skip all forms of transportation and military compounds. After the fighting in the Far East was over in August 1945, the secret tunnel facility was temporarily closed. Because of the growth in freight traffic, there was the need to increase the capacity of the Trans-Siberian Railroad in 1964. The tunnel was the used for the movement of freight trains. After the completion of the electrification of the railway through the tunnel, passenger trains began to pass through it. Until

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

the combination through Amur River was continued - on the railway bridge and the tunnel. In

2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; 2009 Iran ...

, after completion of the second stage of the reconstruction of Amur bridge opening two-way traffic across it, the "bottleneck" problem has been removed. This made it possible to reconstruct the underwater tunnel, after which the construction of the Trans-Siberian Amur link was on three tracks - two on the bridge, and one in the tunnel. Путь к тоннелю, Хабаровск.JPG, Railroad to the east tunnel portal (right bank), Kirovsky City District,

Тоннель под Амуром и хабаровский мост (левый берег).JPG, On the left side of the fence - the left bank (west) portal,
right -

left bank pier bridge. Beside the eastern tunnel portal, there is a granite plate with words:

Notes

{{Reflist

References

фотографии энциклопедии transsib.ru Сергей Сигачев
Railway tunnels in Russia Trans-Siberian Railway Amur River Buildings and structures in Khabarovsk Krai Khabarovsk Rail transport in Khabarovsk Krai

See also

Notes

References