SUBMERGED

FLOATING
TUNNEL
 Presented by:
RAKESH KUMAR
1758061,CE-A
Heritage Institute of Technology, Kolkata
CONTENTS
• Introduction
• Need for Submerged Floating Tunnels
• Concept
• Materials Used
• Structural Components
• Construction Procedure
• Advantages
• Case Study
• Conclusion
• References
 INTRODUCTION
• It is a kind of innovative traffic structure, which is used to cross
sea, large lakes or deep rivers
• It generally consists of tunnel tube suspended in water, anchor
cables fixing displacement of tunnel, deep water foundations
• Submerged Floating Tunnel (SFT), is also known as
Archimedes Bridge
 NEED FOR SUBMERGED FLOATING
TUNNEL
• A “SFT ” is considered when the depth of the water body is too
deep so that no tunnel or any solid body could sustain the
pressure acting on it at such a deep level
• In that case the tunnel is placed such as about 20-50m from
the sea level.
 CONCEPT
• It is based on “Archimedes Principle”
• Any object wholly or partially immersed in an fluid, is buoyed
up by a force equal to the weight of the fluid displaced by the
object.
• Ships, submarines, offshore oil rigs etc. work on this
principle.
• Research shows that the buoyancy to weight ratio for the
tunnel to float should be less than one and between 0.5 to 0.8
 MATERIAL
USED
• Aluminium
• Foam
• Concrete
 STRUCTURAL COMPONENTS OF
SFT
SFT consists of the following elements
• Tubes
• Tethers
• Pontoons
• Shore connections at the ends of the tunnel
TUBE
• Provides space for the road and/or railway traffic.
• The tubes may be constructed of steel, concrete or a
combination of the two.
• Designed with circular cross-sections, primarily from
hydrodynamic reasons. Other shapes as elliptical,
Polygonal.
• Gives space to traffic in one direction and provide escape
possibilities in case of fire.
TETHERS
• Vertical or inclined fixing the tube to the seabed at certain
spacing.
• Gravity anchors on the seabed providing support for the
tethers.
• Vertical tethers gives vertical stiffness, but virtually no
horizontal stiffness. In order to also get horizontal stiffness the
tethers have to be inclined.
PONTOONS
• Pontoons are mounted on top of the tunnel and “anchoring” it
to the sea surface.
• Pontoons penetrating the water surface will add vertical
stiffness to the system, but they will not add anything to the
horizontal stiffness.
• Other measures then have to be added to give
sufficient horizontal strength and stiffness.
SHORE CONNECTIONS

• The connections of the tube to the shore require appropriate

interface elements to couple the flexible water tube with the much
more rigid tunnel bored in the ground.

• This joint should be able to restrain tube movements, without any

unsustainable increase in stresses.
 CONSTRUCTION
PROCEDURE
1. PRECASTING
• Huge tunnel sections are constructed on dry dock.
• The procedure consists same as that of precast construction.
• The panels are transported to their respective places.
2.JOINTS
• After the submersion of different panels in water they are
connected with one another by using the rubber gasket.
• Procedure includes trapping of water between the joints and
then removing it afterwards.
3. FOUNDATION
• This is incase of tethers,
• The application consists same as that of in caisson foundation.
• A hollow chamber is penetrated down the sea bed as shown
which evacuates the water trapped inside it by a valve present
on its top surface.
4. ANCHORING OF CABLES
• The cables are anchored to the floating tunnel which will
avoid its movement and will place it firmly in alignment.
• This operation can be carried out by divers.
 ADVANTAGES
• Allows construction of tunnel in extremely deep water, where
conventional bridges or tunnels are technically difficult or
prohibitively expensive.
• Any type of cross sectional area can be provided since being
prefabricated.
• No obstruction to navigational routes as compared to
conventional bridges since all of the tunnel being placed
underwater.
• Construction activities has less harmful effects on
aquatic life.
 ADVANTAGES
• Vehicular emission can be collected at one end of the tunnel
thus reducing the air pollution.
• No harmful environmental effects such as fog or storm since
the whole structure is covered and is present inside the water.
 CASE STUDY:Norway could build the world's
first floating tunnel

• The west side of Norway is made up of 1,190 fjords,

which, while beautiful, make it very hard to travel
along the country's coastline.
• The Norwegian Public Roads Administration
(NPRA) has proposed the world's first underwater
floating tunnel, which would be submerged in the
Norwegian Sea.
• Predicted to cost $25 billion (around £19 million)
Currently, the drive from
the southern city of
Kristiansand to
Trondheim in the north
takes an excruciating 21
hours and requires seven
ferry crossings.
CASE STUDY: TRANSATLANTIC TUNNEL

• A Transatlantic tunnel is a theoretical submerged

floating tunnel which would span the Atlantic Ocean
between North America and Europe.
• The transatlantic tunnel would be built of 54000
prefabricated sections connected by watertight and
vacuum-tight gaskets.
 COMPONENTS OF TRANSATLANTIC
TUNNEL
Transatlantic tunnel consists of many components. The
main components of this Tunnel are listed below.

• Gasket/shell
• Sea anchors
• Utility conduits and service port
•
• Vacuum pumps
•
• Maglev train
•
 CHALLENGES TO BE FACED
Cost: - Due to lots of material and machinery involved in
project, estimated cost is nearly 1.2  Thousand core
 dollars.
•
• Fire: - It is difficult to rescue people if fire will break out
in train and also to face the problems due to the smoke
of fire.
•
• Collision: -   If in case of collision of two trains took
place, it is very difficult to rescue the people.
•
• No Stoppage: - It is very difficult to stop  the train
 CONCLUSIO
N
• The submerged floating tunnel will set up new trends in
transportation engineering and which shows with the advances
in technology that will reduce the time required for travelling.
• For wide and deep crossings the submerged floating tunnel
may be the only feasible fix link, replacing present day ferries
and providing local communities with new opportunities for
improved communication and regional development.
• Make the transportation more effective by hiding the traffic
under water by which the beauty of landscape in maintained.
 REFERENCES

• Christian Ingerslev "Immersed and floating tunnels".

• Keqian Zhang, Yiqiang Xiang, Yinguang Dub "Research on
tubular segment design of submerged floating tunnel".
• Yiqiang Xiang, Chengxi Liu, Keqian Zhang, Qiangqiang "Risk
analysis and management of submerged floating tunnel and its
applications".
• Bernt Jakobsen "Design of the Submerged Floating Tunnel
operating under various conditions".
• Fei Ge, Wei Lu, Xiaodong Wu, Youshi Hong "Fluid-structure
interaction of submerged floating tunnel in wave field".