CHENNAI: Chennai Metro has completed both the upline and downline underground tunnels on a critical stretch of Corridor-4 of its Phase-II network, marking a key construction milestone beneath some of Chennai’s most congested and sensitive urban precincts.
The breakthrough of the downline tunnel was achieved on Friday when the tunnel boring machine (TBM) Flamingo S-1352A emerged at the Thirumayilai shaft, completing the 1.98-km drive between Light House and Thirumayilai. This followed the earlier completion of the upline tunnel on February 9 by TBM Eagle under the same UG-01 contract.
Executed by Cemindia Projects Limited, the twin tunnels pass beneath the Lighthouse area, the All India Radio campus, the Russian Embassy zone, Rosary Church, the MRTS bridge and the Buckingham Canal—an alignment that required engineers to work through rocky strata, shallow cover, deep overburden caused by stacked tunnel configurations, and unforeseen gas pockets.
With both tunnels now in place, CMRL has cleared a major bottleneck on Corridor-4, a line expected to substantially improve connectivity across Mylapore, Luz and central Chennai upon commissioning.
The two TBMs—Eagle and Flamingo—will next be relaunched from Thirumayilai to begin the subsequent underground drive towards Boat Club, a release stated.
Nine-Minute Non-Stop Transit for Life-Saving Organ Transplant:
Separately, Chennai Metro, on Friday enabled the swift transport of donor lungs and a heart across the city.
Following amendments to the Metro Railways (Carriage and Ticket) Rules, 2023, issued by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, a medical team arriving from Madurai boarded a dedicated non-stop metro service at Meenambakkam.
The train covered seven stations in nine minutes to AG-DMS, from where the organs were rushed by ambulance to Apollo Hospital Greams Road for transplantation. The operation highlighted coordinated planning by metro and medical authorities.