The Channel Tunnel (), also known as the Chunnel, is a  underwater railway tunnel that connects Folkestone (Kent, England) with Coquelles (Pas-de-Calais, France) beneath the English Channel at the Strait of Dover. It is the only fixed link between the island of Great Britain and the European mainland. At its lowest point, it is  below the sea bed and  below sea level. At , it has the longest underwater section of any tunnel in the world and is the third longest railway tunnel in the world. The speed limit for trains through the tunnel is . The tunnel is owned and operated by the company Getlink, formerly "Groupe Eurotunnel".

The tunnel carries high-speed Eurostar passenger trains, LeShuttle services for road vehicles and freight trains. It connects end-to-end with high-speed railway lines: the LGV Nord in France and High Speed 1 in England. In 2017, rail services carried 10.3 million passengers and 1.22 million tonnes of freight, and the Shuttle carried 10.4 million passengers, 2.6 million cars, 51,000 coaches, and 1.6 million lorries (equivalent to 21.3 million tonnes of freight), compared with 11.7 million passengers, 2.6 million lorries and 2.2 million cars by sea through the Port of Dover.

Plans to build a cross-Channel fixed link appeared as early as 1802, but British political and media pressure motivated by fears of compromising national security had disrupted attempts to build one. An early unsuccessful attempt was made in the late 19th century, on the English side, "in the hope of forcing the hand of the English Government". The eventual successful project, organised by Eurotunnel, began construction in 1988 and opened in 1994. Estimated to cost £5.5 billion in 1985, it was at the time the most expensive construction project ever proposed. The cost finally amounted to £9 billion (equivalent to £ billion in ), well over budget.

Since its opening, the tunnel has experienced mechanical problems. Both fires and cold weather have temporarily disrupted its operation. Since at least 1997, aggregations of migrants around Calais seeking entry to the United Kingdom, such as through the tunnel, have prompted deterrence and countermeasures.

Origins

Earlier proposals

In 1802, Albert Mathieu-Favier, a French mining engineer, put forward a proposal to tunnel under the English Channel, with illumination from oil lamps, horse-drawn coaches, and an artificial island positioned mid-Channel for changing horses. His design envisaged a bored two-level tunnel with the top tunnel used for transport and the bottom one for groundwater flows.

In 1839, Aimé Thomé de Gamond, a Frenchman, performed the first geological and hydrographical surveys on the Channel between Calais and Dover. He explored several schemes and, in 1856, presented a proposal to Napoleon III for a mined railway tunnel from Cap Gris-Nez to East Wear Point with a port/airshaft on the Varne sandbank at a cost of 170 million francs, or less than £7 million.

In 1865, a deputation led by George Ward Hunt proposed the idea of a tunnel to the Chancellor of the Exchequer of the day, William Ewart Gladstone.

In 1866, Henry Marc Brunel made a survey of the floor of the Strait of Dover. By his results, he proved that the floor was composed of chalk, like the adjoining cliffs, and thus a tunnel was feasible. For this survey, he invented the gravity corer, which is still used in geology.

Around 1866, William Low and Sir John Hawkshaw promoted tunnel ideas, but apart from preliminary geological studies, none were implemented.

An official Anglo-French protocol was established in 1876 for a cross-Channel railway tunnel.

In 1881, British railway entrepreneur Sir Edward Watkin and Alexandre Lavalley, a French Suez Canal contractor, were in the Anglo-French Submarine Railway Company that conducted exploratory work on both sides of the Channel. From June 1882 to March 1883, the British tunnel boring machine tunneled, through chalk, a total of , while Lavalley used a similar machine to drill  from Sangatte on the French side. However, the cross-Channel tunnel project was abandoned in 1883, despite this success, after fears raised by the British military that an underwater tunnel might be used as an invasion route. Nevertheless, in 1883, this TBM was used to bore a railway ventilation tunnel— in diameter and  long—between Birkenhead and Liverpool, England, through sandstone under the Mersey River. These early works were encountered more than a century later during the TML project.

A 1907 film, Tunnelling the English Channel by pioneer filmmaker Georges Méliès, depicts King Edward VII and President Armand Fallières dreaming of building a tunnel under the English Channel.

In 1919, during the Paris Peace Conference, British prime minister David Lloyd George repeatedly brought up the idea of a Channel tunnel as a way of reassuring France about British willingness to defend against another German attack. The French did not take the idea seriously, and nothing came of the proposal.

In the 1920s, Winston Churchill advocated for the Channel Tunnel, using that exact name in his essay "Should Strategists Veto The Tunnel?" It was published on 27 July 1924 in the Weekly Dispatch, and argued vehemently against the idea that the tunnel could be used by a Continental enemy in an invasion of Britain. Churchill expressed his enthusiasm for the project again in an article for the Daily Mail on 12 February 1936, "Why Not A Channel Tunnel?"

There was another proposal in 1929, but nothing came of this discussion and the idea was shelved. Proponents estimated the construction cost at US$150 million. The engineers had addressed the concerns of both nations' military leaders by designing two sumps—one near the coast of each country—that could be flooded at will to block the tunnel but this did not appease military leaders, or dispel concerns about hordes of tourists who would disrupt English life. Military fears continued during the Second World War. After the fall of France, as Britain prepared for an expected German invasion, a Royal Navy officer in the Directorate of Miscellaneous Weapons Development calculated that Hitler could use slave labour to build two Channel tunnels in 18 months. The estimate caused rumours that Germany had already begun digging.

A British film from Gaumont Studios, The Tunnel (also called TransAtlantic Tunnel), was released in 1935 as a science-fiction project concerning the creation of a transatlantic tunnel. It referred briefly to its protagonist, a Mr. McAllan, as having completed a British Channel tunnel successfully in 1940, five years into the future of the film's release.

By 1955, defence arguments had become less relevant due to the dominance of air power, and both the British and French governments supported technical and geological surveys. In 1958 the 1881 workings were cleared in preparation for a £100,000 geological survey by the Channel Tunnel Study Group. 30% of the funding came from Channel Tunnel Co Ltd, the largest shareholder of which was the British Transport Commission, as successor to the South Eastern Railway. A detailed geological survey was carried out in 1964 and 1965.

Although the two countries agreed to build a tunnel in 1964, the phase 1 initial studies and signing of a second agreement to cover phase 2 took until 1973.  The plan described a government-funded project to create two tunnels to accommodate car shuttle wagons on either side of a service tunnel. Construction started on both sides of the Channel in 1974.

On 20 January 1975, to the dismay of their French partners, the then-governing Labour Party in Britain cancelled the project due to uncertainty about EEC membership, doubling cost estimates and the general economic crisis at the time.  By this time the British tunnel boring machine was ready and the Ministry of Transport had conducted a  experimental drive. (This short tunnel, called Adit A1, was eventually reused as the starting and access point for tunnelling operations from the British side, and remains an access point to the service tunnel.) The cancellation costs were estimated at £17 million.  On the French side, a tunnel-boring machine had been installed underground in a stub tunnel. It lay there for 14 years until 1988, when it was sold, dismantled, refurbished and shipped to Turkey, where it was used to drive the Moda tunnel for the Istanbul Sewerage Scheme.

Initiation of project

In 1979, the "Mouse-hole Project" was suggested when the Conservatives came to power in Britain. The concept was a single-track rail tunnel with a service tunnel but without shuttle terminals. The British government took no interest in funding the project, but British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher did not object to a privately funded project, although she said she assumed it would be for cars rather than trains. In 1981, Thatcher and French president François Mitterrand agreed to establish a working group to evaluate a privately funded project. In June 1982 the Franco-British study group favoured a twin tunnel to accommodate conventional trains and a vehicle shuttle service. In April 1985 promoters were invited to submit scheme proposals. Four submissions were shortlisted:
 Channel Tunnel, a rail proposal based on the 1975 scheme presented by Channel Tunnel Group/France–Manche (CTG/F–M).
 Eurobridge, a  suspension bridge with a series of  spans with a roadway in an enclosed tube.
 Euroroute, a  tunnel between artificial islands approached by bridges.
 Channel Expressway, a set of large-diameter road tunnels with mid-Channel ventilation towers.

The cross-Channel ferry industry protested under the name "Flexilink". In 1975 there was no campaign protesting a fixed link, with one of the largest ferry operators (Sealink) being state-owned. Flexilink continued rousing opposition throughout 1986 and 1987. Public opinion strongly favoured a drive-through tunnel, but concerns about ventilation, accident management and driver mesmerisation led to the only shortlisted rail submission, CTG/F-M, being awarded the project in January 1986. Reasons given for the selection included that it caused least disruption to shipping in the Channel and least environmental disruption, was the best protected against terrorism, and was the most likely to attract sufficient private finance.

Arrangement

The British Channel Tunnel Group consisted of two banks and five construction companies, while their French counterparts, France–Manche, consisted of three banks and five construction companies. The banks' role was to advise on financing and secure loan commitments. On 2 July 1985, the groups formed Channel Tunnel Group/France–Manche (CTG/F–M). Their submission to the British and French governments was drawn from the 1975 project, including 11 volumes and a substantial environmental impact statement.

The Anglo-French Treaty on the Channel Tunnel was signed by both governments in Canterbury Cathedral. The Treaty of Canterbury (1986) prepared the Concession for the construction and operation of the Fixed Link by privately owned companies and outlined arbitration methods to be used in the event of disputes. It set up the Intergovernmental Commission (IGC), responsible for monitoring all matters associated with the Tunnel's construction and operation on behalf of the British and French governments, and a Safety Authority to advise the IGC.
It drew a land frontier between the two countries in the middle of the Channel tunnel—the first of its kind.

Design and construction were done by the ten construction companies in the CTG/F-M group. The French terminal and boring from Sangatte were done by the five French construction companies in the joint venture group GIE Transmanche Construction. The English Terminal and boring from Shakespeare Cliff were done by the five British construction companies in the Translink Joint Venture. The two partnerships were linked by a bi-national project organisation, TransManche Link (TML). The Maître d'Oeuvre was a supervisory engineering body employed by Eurotunnel under the terms of the concession that monitored the project and reported to the governments and banks.

In France, with its long tradition of infrastructure investment, the project had widespread approval. The French National Assembly approved it unanimously in April 1987, and after a public inquiry, the Senate approved it unanimously in June. In Britain, select committees examined the proposal, making history by holding hearings away from Westminster, in Kent. In February 1987, the third reading of the Channel Tunnel Bill took place in the House of Commons, and passed by 94 votes to 22. The Channel Tunnel Act gained Royal assent and passed into law in July. Parliamentary support for the project came partly from provincial members of Parliament on the basis of promises of regional Eurostar through train services that never materialised; the promises were repeated in 1996 when the contract for construction of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link was awarded.

Cost
The tunnel is a build-own-operate-transfer (BOOT) project with a concession. TML would design and build the tunnel, but financing was through a separate legal entity, Eurotunnel. Eurotunnel absorbed CTG/F-M and signed a construction contract with TML, but the British and French governments controlled final engineering and safety decisions, now in the hands of the Channel Tunnel Safety Authority. The British and French governments gave Eurotunnel a 55-year operating concession (from 1987; extended by 10 years to 65 years in 1993) to repay loans and pay dividends. A Railway Usage Agreement was signed between Eurotunnel, British Rail and SNCF guaranteeing future revenue in exchange for the railways obtaining half of the tunnel's capacity.

Private funding for such a complex infrastructure project was of unprecedented scale. Initial equity of £45 million was raised by CTG/F-M, increased by £206 million private institutional placement, £770 million was raised in a public share offer that included press and television advertisements, a syndicated bank loan and letter of credit arranged £5 billion. Privately financed, the total investment costs at 1985 prices were £2.6 billion. At the 1994 completion actual costs were, in 1985 prices, £4.65 billion: an 80% cost overrun. The cost overrun was partly due to enhanced safety, security, and environmental demands. Financing costs were 140% higher than forecast.

Construction

Working from both the English and French sides of the Channel, eleven tunnel boring machines or TBMs cut through chalk marl to construct two rail tunnels and a service tunnel. The vehicle shuttle terminals are at Cheriton (part of Folkestone) and Coquelles, and are connected to the English M20 and French A16 motorways respectively.

Tunnelling commenced in 1988, and the tunnel began operating in 1994. In 1985 prices, the total construction cost was £4.65 billion (equivalent to £ billion in 2015), an 80% cost overrun. At the peak of construction 15,000 people were employed with daily expenditure over £3 million. Ten workers, eight of them British, were killed during construction between 1987 and 1993, most in the first few months of boring.

Completion

A  diameter pilot hole allowed the service tunnel to break through without ceremony on 30 October 1990. On 1 December 1990, Englishman Graham Fagg and Frenchman Phillippe Cozette broke through the service tunnel with the media watching. Eurotunnel completed the tunnel on time. (A BBC TV television commentator called Graham Fagg "the first man to cross the Channel by land for 8000 years".)  The two tunnelling efforts met each other with an offset of only . A Paddington Bear soft toy was chosen by British tunnellers as the first item to pass through to their French counterparts when the two sides met.

The tunnel was officially opened, one year later than originally planned, by Queen Elizabeth II and the French president, François Mitterrand, in a ceremony held in Calais on 6 May 1994. The Queen travelled through the tunnel to Calais on a Eurostar train, which stopped nose to nose with the train that carried President Mitterrand from Paris. Following the ceremony President Mitterrand and the Queen travelled on Le Shuttle to a similar ceremony in Folkestone. A full public service did not start for several months. The first freight train, however, ran on 1 June 1994 and carried Rover and Mini cars being exported to Italy.

The Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), now called High Speed 1, runs  from St Pancras railway station in London to the tunnel portal at Folkestone in Kent. It cost £5.8 billion. On 16 September 2003 the prime minister, Tony Blair, opened the first section of High Speed 1, from Folkestone to north Kent. On 6 November 2007, the Queen officially opened High Speed 1 and St Pancras International station, replacing the original slower link to Waterloo International railway station. High Speed 1 trains travel at up to , the journey from London to Paris taking 2 hours 15 minutes, to Brussels 1 hour 51 minutes.

In 1994, the American Society of Civil Engineers elected the tunnel as one of the seven modern Wonders of the World. In 1995, the American magazine Popular Mechanics published the results.

Opening dates
The opening was phased for various services offered as the Channel Tunnel Safety Authority, the IGC, gave permission for various services to begin at several dates over the period 1994/1995 but start-up dates were a few days later.

Engineering

Site investigation undertaken in the 20 years before construction confirmed earlier speculations that a tunnel could be bored through a chalk marl stratum. The chalk marl is conducive to tunnelling, with impermeability, ease of excavation and strength. The chalk marl runs along the entire length of the English side of the tunnel, but on the French side a length of  has variable and difficult geology. The tunnel consists of three bores: two  diameter rail tunnels,  apart,  in length with a  diameter service tunnel in between. The three bores are connected by cross-passages and piston relief ducts. The service tunnel was used as a pilot tunnel, boring ahead of the main tunnels to determine the conditions. English access was provided at Shakespeare Cliff and French access from a shaft at Sangatte. The French side used five tunnel boring machines (TBMs), and the English side six. The service tunnel uses Service Tunnel Transport System (STTS) and Light Service Tunnel Vehicles (LADOGS). Fire safety was a critical design issue.

Between the portals at Beussingue and Castle Hill the tunnel is  long, with  under land on the French side and  on the UK side, and  under sea. It is the third-longest rail tunnel in the world, behind the Gotthard Base Tunnel in Switzerland and the Seikan Tunnel in Japan, but with the longest under-sea section. The average depth is  below the seabed. On the UK side, of the expected  of spoil approximately  was used for fill at the terminal site, and the remainder was deposited at Lower Shakespeare Cliff behind a seawall, reclaiming  of land. This land was then made into the Samphire Hoe Country Park. Environmental impact assessment did not identify any major risks for the project, and further studies into safety, noise, and air pollution were overall positive. However, environmental objections were raised over a high-speed link to London.

Geology

Successful tunnelling required a sound understanding of topography and geology and the selection of the best rock strata through which to dig. The geology of this site generally consists of northeasterly dipping Cretaceous strata, part of the northern limb of the Wealden-Boulonnais dome. Characteristics include:
 Continuous chalk on the cliffs on either side of the Channel containing no major faulting, as observed by Verstegan in 1605.
 Four geological strata, marine sediments laid down 90–100 million years ago; pervious upper and middle chalk above slightly pervious lower chalk and finally impermeable Gault Clay. A sandy stratum, glauconitic marl (tortia), is in between the chalk marl and gault clay.
 A  layer of chalk marl (French: craie bleue) in the lower third of the lower chalk appeared to present the best tunnelling medium. The chalk has a clay content of 30–40% providing impermeability to groundwater yet relatively easy excavation with strength allowing minimal support. Ideally, the tunnel would be bored in the bottom  of the chalk marl, allowing water inflow from fractures and joints to be minimised, but above the gault clay that would increase stress on the tunnel lining and swell and soften when wet.

On the English side, the stratum dip is less than 5°; on the French side, this increases to 20°. Jointing and faulting are present on both sides. On the English side, only minor faults of displacement less than  exist; on the French side, displacements of up to  are present owing to the Quenocs anticlinal fold. The faults are of limited width, filled with calcite, pyrite and remolded clay. The increased dip and faulting restricted the selection of routes on the French side. To avoid confusion, microfossil assemblages were used to classify the chalk marl. On the French side, particularly near the coast, the chalk was harder, more brittle and more fractured than on the English side. This led to the adoption of different tunnelling techniques on the two sides.

The Quaternary undersea valley Fosse Dangeard, and Castle Hill landslip at the English portal, caused concerns. Identified by the 1964–65 geophysical survey, the Fosse Dangeard is an infilled valley system extending  below the seabed,  south of the tunnel route in mid-channel. A 1986 survey showed that a tributary crossed the path of the tunnel, and so the tunnel route was made as far north and deep as possible. The English terminal had to be located in the Castle Hill landslip, which consists of displaced and tipping blocks of lower chalk, glauconitic marl and gault debris. Thus the area was stabilised by buttressing and inserting drainage adits. The service tunnel acted as a pilot preceding the main ones, so that the geology, areas of crushed rock, and zones of high water inflow could be predicted. Exploratory probing took place in the service tunnel, in the form of extensive forward probing, vertical downward probes and sideways probing.

Site investigation
Marine soundings and samplings by Thomé de Gamond were carried out during 1833–67, establishing the seabed depth at a maximum of  and the continuity of geological strata (layers). Surveying continued over many years, with 166 marine and 70 land-deep boreholes being drilled and over 4,000 line kilometres of the marine geophysical survey completed. Surveys were undertaken in 1958–1959, 1964–1965, 1972–1974 and 1986–1988.

The surveying in 1958–59 catered for immersed tube and bridge designs, as well as a bored tunnel, and thus a wide area was investigated. At this time, marine geophysics surveying for engineering projects was in its infancy, with poor positioning and resolution from seismic profiling. The 1964–65 surveys concentrated on a northerly route that left the English coast at Dover harbour; using 70 boreholes, an area of deeply weathered rock with high permeability was located just south of Dover harbour.

Given the previous survey results and access constraints, a more southerly route was investigated in the 1972–73 survey, and the route was confirmed to be feasible. Information for the tunnelling project also came from work before the 1975 cancellation. On the French side at Sangatte, a deep shaft with adits was made. On the English side at Shakespeare Cliff, the government allowed  of  diameter tunnel to be driven. The actual tunnel alignment, method of excavation and support were essentially the same as the 1975 attempt. In the 1986–87 survey, previous findings were reinforced, and the characteristics of the gault clay and the tunnelling medium (chalk marl that made up 85% of the route) were investigated. Geophysical techniques from the oil industry were employed.

Tunnelling

Tunnelling was a major engineering challenge, with the only precedent being the undersea Seikan Tunnel in Japan, which opened in 1988. A serious health and safety risk with building tunnels underwater is major water inflow due to the high hydrostatic pressure from the sea above, under weak ground conditions. The tunnel also had the challenge of time: being privately funded, the early financial return was paramount.

The objective was to construct two  rail tunnels,  apart,  in length; a  service tunnel between the two main ones; pairs of -diameter cross-passages linking the rail tunnels to the service one at  spacing; piston relief ducts  in diameter connecting the rail tunnels  apart; two undersea crossover caverns to connect the rail tunnels, with the service tunnel always preceding the main ones by at least  to ascertain the ground conditions. There was plenty of experience with excavating through chalk in the mining industry, while the undersea crossover caverns were a complex engineering problem. The French one was based on the Mount Baker Ridge freeway tunnel in Seattle; the UK cavern was dug from the service tunnel ahead of the main ones, to avoid delay.

Precast segmental linings in the main TBM drives were used, but two different solutions were used. On the French side, neoprene and grout sealed bolted linings made of cast iron or high-strength reinforced concrete were used; on the English side, the main requirement was for speed so bolting of cast-iron lining segments was only carried out in areas of poor geology. In the UK rail tunnels, eight lining segments plus a key segment were used; in the French side, five segments plus a key. On the French side, a  diameter  deep grout-curtained shaft at Sangatte was used for access. On the English side, a marshalling area was  below the top of Shakespeare Cliff, the New Austrian Tunnelling method (NATM) was first applied in the chalk marl here. On the English side, the land tunnels were driven from Shakespeare Cliff—the same place as the marine tunnels—not from Folkestone. The platform at the base of the cliff was not large enough for all of the drives and, despite environmental objections, tunnel spoil was placed behind a reinforced concrete seawall, on condition of placing the chalk in an enclosed lagoon, to avoid wide dispersal of chalk fines. Owing to limited space, the precast lining factory was on the Isle of Grain in the Thames estuary, which used Scottish granite aggregate delivered by ship from the Foster Yeoman coastal super quarry at Glensanda in Loch Linnhe on the west coast of Scotland.

On the French side, owing to the greater permeability to water, earth pressure balance TBMs with open and closed modes was used. The TBMs were of a closed nature during the initial , but then operated as open, boring through the chalk marl stratum. This minimised the impact to the ground, allowed high water pressures to be withstood and it also alleviated the need to grout ahead of the tunnel. The French effort required five TBMs: two main marine machines, one mainland machine (the short land drives of  allowed one TBM to complete the first drive then reverse direction and complete the other), and two service tunnel machines. On the English side, the simpler geology allowed faster open-faced TBMs. Six machines were used; all commenced digging from Shakespeare Cliff, three marine-bound and three for the land tunnels. Towards the completion of the undersea drives, the UK TBMs were driven steeply downwards and buried clear of the tunnel. These buried TBMs were then used to provide an electrical earth. The French TBMs then completed the tunnel and were dismantled. A  gauge railway was used on the English side during construction.

In contrast to the English machines, which were given technical names, the French tunnelling machines were all named after women: Brigitte, Europa, Catherine, Virginie, Pascaline, Séverine.

At the end of the tunnelling, one machine was on display at the side of the M20 motorway in Folkestone until Eurotunnel sold it on eBay for £39,999 to a scrap metal merchant. Another machine (T4 "Virginie") still survives on the French side, adjacent to Junction 41 on the A16, in the middle of the D243E3/D243E4 roundabout. On it are the words "hommage aux bâtisseurs du tunnel", meaning "tribute to the builders of the tunnel".

Tunnel boring machines
The eleven tunnel boring machines were designed and manufactured through a joint venture between the Robbins Company of Kent, Washington, United States; Markham & Co. of Chesterfield, England; and Kawasaki Heavy Industries of Japan. The TBMs for the service tunnels and main tunnels on the UK side were designed and manufactured by James Howden & Company Ltd, Scotland.

Railway design

Loading gauge

The loading gauge height is .

Communications
There are three communication systems:
 Concession radio (CR) for mobile vehicles and personnel within Eurotunnel's Concession (terminals, tunnels, coastal shafts)
 Track-to-train radio (TTR) for secure speech and data between trains and the railway control centre
 Shuttle internal radio (SIR) for communication between shuttle crew and to passengers over car radios

Power supply
Power is delivered to the locomotives via an overhead line at . with a normal overhead clearance of . All tunnel services run on electricity, shared equally from English and French sources. There are two substations fed at 400 kV at each terminal, but in an emergency, the tunnel's lighting (about 20,000 light fittings) and the plant can be powered solely from either England or France.

The traditional railway south of London uses a 750 V DC third rail to deliver electricity, but since the opening of High Speed 1 there is no longer any need for tunnel trains to use it. High Speed 1, the tunnel and the LGV Nord all have power provided via overhead catenary at 25 kV 50 Hz. The railways on "classic" lines in Belgium are also electrified by overhead wires, but at 3000 V DC.

Signalling
A cab signalling system gives information directly to train drivers on a display. There is a train protection system that stops the train if the speed exceeds that indicated on the in-cab display. TVM430, as used on LGV Nord and High Speed 1, is used in the tunnel. The TVM signalling is interconnected with the signalling on the high-speed lines on either side, allowing trains to enter and exit the tunnel system without stopping. The maximum speed is .

Signalling in the tunnel is coordinated from two control centres:  The main control centre at the Folkestone terminal, and a backup at the Calais terminal, which is staffed at all times and can take over all operations in the event of a breakdown or emergency.

Track system

Conventional ballasted tunnel track was ruled out owing to the difficulty of maintenance and lack of stability and precision.  The Sonneville International Corporation's track system was chosen based on reliability and cost-effectiveness based on a good performance in Swiss tunnels and worldwide. The type of track used is known as Low Vibration Track (LVT). Like a ballasted track, the LVT is of the free-floating type, held in place by gravity and friction. Reinforced concrete blocks of 100 kg support the rails every 60 cm and are held by 12 mm thick closed-cell polymer foam pads placed at the bottom of rubber boots. The latter separates the blocks' mass movements from the lean encasement concrete. The ballastless track provides extra overhead clearance necessary for the passage of larger trains. The corrugated rubber walls of the boots add a degree of isolation of horizontal wheel-rail vibrations and are insulators of the track signal circuit in the humid tunnel environment. UIC60 (60 kg/m) rails of 900A grade rest on  rail pads, which fit the RN/Sonneville bolted dual leaf-springs. The rails, LVT-blocks and their boots with pads were assembled outside the tunnel, in a fully automated process developed by the LVT inventor, Mr. Roger Sonneville. About 334,000 Sonneville blocks were made on the Sangatte site.

Maintenance activities are less than projected. Initially, the rails were ground on a yearly basis or after approximately 100MGT of traffic. Ride quality continues to be noticeably smooth and of low noise. Maintenance is facilitated by the existence of two tunnel junctions or crossover facilities, allowing for two-way operation in each of the six tunnel segments, and providing safe access for maintenance of one isolated tunnel segment at a time. The two crossovers are the largest artificial undersea caverns ever built, at150 m long, 10 m high and 18 m wide. The English crossover is  from Shakespeare Cliff, and the French crossover is  from Sangatte.

Ventilation, cooling and drainage
The ventilation system maintains the air pressure in the service tunnel higher than in the rail tunnels, so that in the event of a fire, smoke does not enter the service tunnel from the rail tunnels. Two cooling water pipes in each rail tunnel circulate chilled water to remove heat generated by the rail traffic. Pumping stations remove water in the tunnels from rain, seepage, and so on.

During the design stage of the tunnel, engineers found that its aerodynamic properties and the heat generated by high-speed trains as they passed through it would raise the temperature inside the tunnel to . As well as making the trains "unbearably warm" for passengers, this also presented a risk of equipment failure and track distortion. To cool the tunnel to below , engineers installed  of  diameter cooling pipes carrying  of water. The network—Europe's largest cooling system—was supplied by eight York Titan chillers running on R22, a hydrochlorofluorocarbon (HCFC) refrigerant gas.

Due to R22's ozone depletion potential (ODP) and high global warming potential (GWP), its use is being phased out in developed countries. Since 1 January 2015, it has been illegal in Europe to use HCFCs to service air-conditioning equipment; broken equipment that used HCFCs must be replaced with equipment that does not use it. In 2016, Trane was selected to provide replacement chillers for the tunnel's cooling network. The York chillers were decommissioned and four "next generation" Trane Series E CenTraVac large-capacity (2600 kW to 14,000 kW) chillers were installed—two in Sangatte, France, and two at Shakespeare Cliff, UK. The energy-efficient chillers, using Honeywell's non-flammable, ultra-low GWP R1233zd(E) refrigerant, maintain temperatures at , and in their first year of operation generated savings of 4.8 GWh—approximately 33%, equating to €500,000 ($585,000)—for tunnel operator Getlink.

Rolling stock

Rolling stock used previously

Operators

LeShuttle

Getlink operates the LeShuttle, a vehicle shuttle service, through the tunnel.

Car shuttle sets have two separate halves: single and double deck. Each half has two loading/unloading wagons and 12 carrier wagons. Eurotunnel's original order was for nine car shuttle sets.

Heavy goods vehicle (HGV) shuttle sets also have two halves, with each half containing one loading wagon, one unloading wagon and 14 carrier wagons. There is a club car behind the leading locomotive, where drivers must stay during the journey. Eurotunnel originally ordered six HGV shuttle sets.

Initially 38 LeShuttle locomotives were commissioned, with one at each end of a shuttle train.

Freight locomotives

Forty-six Class 92 locomotives for hauling freight trains and overnight passenger trains (the Nightstar project, which was abandoned) were commissioned, running on both overhead AC and third-rail DC power. However, RFF does not let these run on French railways, so there are plans to certify Alstom Prima II locomotives for use in the tunnel.

International passenger

Thirty-one Eurostar trains, based on the French TGV, built to UK loading gauge with many modifications for safety within the tunnel, were commissioned, with ownership split between British Rail, French national railways (SNCF) and Belgian national railways (NMBS/SNCB). British Rail ordered seven more for services north of London. Around 2010, Eurostar ordered ten trains from Siemens based on its Velaro product. The Class 374 entered service in 2016 and has been operating through the Channel Tunnel ever since alongside the current Class 373.

Germany (DB) has since around 2005 tried to get permission to run train services to London. At the end of 2009, extensive fire-proofing requirements were dropped and DB received permission to run German Intercity-Express (ICE) test trains through the tunnel. In June 2013 DB was granted access to the tunnel, but these plans were ultimately dropped.

In October 2021, Renfe, the Spanish state railway company, expressed interest in operating a cross-Channel route between Paris and London using some of their existing trains with the intention of competing with Eurostar. No details have been revealed as to which trains would be used.

Service locomotives
Diesel locomotives for rescue and shunting work are Eurotunnel Class 0001 and Eurotunnel Class 0031.

Operation
The following chart presents the estimated number of passengers and tonnes of freight, respectively, annually transported through the Channel Tunnel since 1994 (M = million).

Usage and services

Transport services offered by the tunnel are as follows:
 Eurotunnel Le Shuttle roll-on roll-off shuttle service for road vehicles and their drivers and passengers,
 Eurostar passenger trains,
 through freight trains.

Both the freight and passenger traffic forecasts that led to the construction of the tunnel were overestimated; in particular, Eurotunnel's commissioned forecasts were over-predictions. Although the captured share of Channel crossings was forecast correctly, high competition (especially from budget airlines which expanded rapidly in the 1990s and 2000s) and reduced tariffs led to low revenue. Overall cross-Channel traffic was overestimated.

With the EU's liberalisation of international rail services, the tunnel and High Speed 1 have been open to competition since 2010. There have been a number of operators interested in running trains through the tunnel and along High Speed 1 to London. In June 2013, after several years, DB obtained a license to operate Frankfurt – London trains, not expected to run before 2016 because of delivery delays of the custom-made trains.
Plans for the service to Frankfurt seem to have been shelved in 2018.

Passenger traffic volumes
Cross-tunnel passenger traffic volumes peaked at 18.4 million in 1998, dropped to 14.9 million in 2003 and has increased substantially since then.

At the time of the decision about building the tunnel, 15.9 million passengers were predicted for Eurostar trains in the opening year. In 1995, the first full year, actual numbers were a little over 2.9 million, growing to 7.1 million in 2000, then dropping to 6.3 million in 2003. Eurostar was initially limited by the lack of a high-speed connection on the British side. After the completion of High Speed 1 in two stages in 2003 and 2007, traffic increased. In 2008, Eurostar carried 9,113,371 passengers, a 10% increase over the previous year, despite traffic limitations due to the 2008 Channel Tunnel fire. Eurostar passenger numbers continued to increase.

Freight traffic volumes
Freight volumes have been erratic, with a major decrease during 1997 due to a closure caused by a fire in a freight shuttle. Freight crossings increased over the period, indicating the substitutability of the tunnel by sea crossings. The tunnel has achieved a market share close to or above Eurotunnel's 1980s predictions but Eurotunnel's 1990 and 1994 predictions were overestimates.

For through freight trains, the first year prediction was 7.2 million tonnes; the actual 1995 figure was 1.3M tonnes. Through freight volumes peaked in 1998 at 3.1M tonnes. This fell back to 1.21M tonnes in 2007, increasing slightly to 1.24M tonnes in 2008. Together with that carried on freight shuttles, freight growth has occurred since opening, with 6.4M tonnes carried in 1995, 18.4M tonnes recorded in 2003 and 19.6M tonnes in 2007. Numbers fell back in the wake of the 2008 fire.

Eurotunnel's freight subsidiary is Europorte 2. In September 2006 EWS, the UK's largest rail freight operator, announced that owing to the cessation of UK-French government subsidies of £52 million per annum to cover the tunnel "Minimum User Charge" (a subsidy of around £13,000 per train, at a traffic level of 4,000 trains per annum), freight trains would stop running after 30 November.

Economic performance
Shares in Eurotunnel were issued at £3.50 per share on 9 December 1987. By mid-1989 the price had risen to £11.00. Delays and cost overruns led to the price dropping; during demonstration runs in October 1994, it reached an all-time low. Eurotunnel suspended payment on its debt in September 1995 to avoid bankruptcy. In December 1997 the British and French governments extended Eurotunnel's operating concession by 34 years, to 2086. The financial restructuring of Eurotunnel occurred in mid-1998, reducing debt and financial charges. Despite the restructuring, The Economist reported in 1998 that to break even Eurotunnel would have to increase fares, traffic and market share for sustainability. A cost-benefit analysis of the tunnel indicated that there were few impacts on the wider economy and few developments associated with the project and that the British economy would have been better off if it had not been constructed.

Under the terms of the Concession, Eurotunnel was obliged to investigate a cross-Channel road tunnel. In December 1999 road and rail tunnel proposals were presented to the British and French governments, but it was stressed that there was not enough demand for a second tunnel. A three-way treaty between the United Kingdom, France and Belgium governs border controls, with the establishment of control zones wherein the officers of the other nation may exercise limited customs and law enforcement powers. For most purposes, these are at either end of the tunnel, with the French border controls on the UK side of the tunnel and vice versa. For some city-to-city trains, the train is a control zone. A binational emergency plan coordinates UK and French emergency activities.

In 1999 Eurostar posted its first net profit, having made a loss of £925m in 1995. In 2005 Eurotunnel was described as being in a serious situation. In 2013, operating profits rose 4 percent from 2012, to £54 million.

Security
There is a need for full passport controls, as the tunnel acts as a border between the Schengen Area and the Common Travel Area. There are juxtaposed controls, meaning that passports are checked before boarding by officials of the departing country, and on arrival by officials of the destination country. These control points are only at the main Eurostar stations: French officials operate at London St Pancras, Ebbsfleet International and Ashford International, while British officials operate at Calais-Fréthun, Lille-Europe, Marne-la-Vallée–Chessy, Brussels-South and Paris-Gare du Nord. There are security checks before boarding as well. For the shuttle road-vehicle trains, there are juxtaposed passport controls before boarding the trains.

For Eurostar trains originating south of Paris, there is no passport and security check before departure, and those trains must stop in Lille at least 30 minutes to allow all passengers to be checked. No checks are performed on board. There have been plans for services from Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Cologne to London, but a major reason to cancel them was the need for a stop in Lille. Direct service from London to Amsterdam started on 4 April 2018; following the building of check-in terminals at Amsterdam and Rotterdam and the intergovernmental agreement, a direct service from the two Dutch cities to London started on 30 April 2020.

Terminals

The terminals' sites are at Cheriton (near Folkestone in the United Kingdom) and Coquelles (near Calais in France). The UK site uses the M20 motorway for access. The terminals are organised with the frontier controls juxtaposed with the entry to the system to allow travellers to go onto the motorway at the destination country immediately after leaving the shuttle.

To achieve design output at the French terminal, the shuttles accept cars on double-deck wagons; for flexibility, ramps were placed inside the shuttles to provide access to the top decks. At Folkestone there are  of the main-line track, 45 turnouts and eight platforms. At Calais there are  of track and 44 turnouts. At the terminals, the shuttle trains traverse a figure eight to reduce uneven wear on the wheels. There is a freight marshalling yard west of Cheriton at Dollands Moor Freight Yard.

Regional impact
A 1996 report from the European Commission predicted that Kent and Nord-Pas de Calais had to face increased traffic volumes due to the general growth of cross-Channel traffic and traffic attracted by the tunnel. In Kent, a high-speed rail line to London would transfer traffic from road to rail. Kent's regional development would benefit from the tunnel, but being so close to London restricts the benefits. Gains are in the traditional industries and are largely dependent on the development of Ashford International railway station, without which Kent would be totally dependent on London's expansion. Nord-Pas-de-Calais enjoys a strong internal symbolic effect of the Tunnel which results in significant gains in manufacturing.

The removal of a bottleneck by means like the tunnel does not necessarily induce economic gains in all adjacent regions. The image of a region being connected to European high-speed transport and active political response is more important for regional economic development. Some small-medium enterprises located in the immediate vicinity of the terminal have used the opportunity to re-brand the profile of their business with positive effects, such as The New Inn at Etchinghill which was able to commercially exploit its unique selling point as being 'the closest pub to the Channel Tunnel'. Tunnel-induced regional development is small compared to general economic growth. The South East of England is likely to benefit developmentally and socially from faster and cheaper transport to continental Europe, but the benefits are unlikely to be equally distributed throughout the region. The overall environmental impact is almost certainly negative.

Since the opening of the tunnel, small positive impacts on the wider economy have been felt, but it is difficult to identify major economic successes directly attributed to the tunnel. The Eurotunnel does operate profitably, offering an alternative transportation mode unaffected by poor weather. High costs of construction did delay profitability, however, and companies involved in the tunnel's construction and operation early in operation relied on government aid to deal with the accumulated debt.

Illegal immigration

Illegal immigrants and would-be asylum seekers have used the tunnel to attempt to enter Britain. By 1997, the problem had attracted international press attention, and by 1999, the French Red Cross opened the first migrant centre at Sangatte, using a warehouse once used for tunnel construction; by 2002, it housed up to 1,500 people at a time, most of them trying to get to the UK. In 2001, most came from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran, but African countries were also represented.

Eurotunnel, the company that operates the crossing, said that more than 37,000 migrants were intercepted between January and July 2015. Approximately 3,000 migrants, mainly from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan and Afghanistan, were living in the temporary camps erected in Calais at the time of an official count in July 2015. An estimated 3,000 to 5,000 migrants were waiting in Calais for a chance to get to England.

Britain and France operate a system of juxtaposed controls on immigration and customs, where investigations happen before travel. France is part of the Schengen immigration zone, removing border checks in normal times between most EU member states; Britain and the Republic of Ireland form their own separate Common Travel Area immigration zone.

Most illegal immigrants and would-be asylum seekers who got into Britain found some way to ride a freight train. Trucks are loaded onto freight trains. In a few instances, migrants stowed away in a liquid chocolate tanker and managed to survive, spread across several attempts.  Although the facilities were fenced, airtight security was deemed impossible; migrants would even jump from bridges onto moving trains. In several incidents people were injured during the crossing; others tampered with railway equipment, causing delays and requiring repairs. Eurotunnel said it was losing £5m per month because of the problem.

In 2001 and 2002, several riots broke out at Sangatte, and groups of migrants (up to 550 in a December 2001 incident) stormed the fences and attempted to enter en masse.

Other migrants seeking permanent UK settlement use the Eurostar passenger train. They may purport to be visitors (whether to be issued with a required visit visa, or deny and falsify their true intentions to obtain a maximum of 6-months-in-a-year at-port stamp); purport to be someone else whose documents they hold, or used forged or counterfeit passports. Such breaches result in refusal of permission to enter the UK, affected by Border Force after such a person's identity is fully established, assuming they persist in their application to enter the UK.

Diplomatic efforts
Local authorities in both France and the UK called for the closure of the Sangatte migrant camp, and Eurotunnel twice sought an injunction against the centre. As of 2006 the United Kingdom blamed France for allowing Sangatte to open, and France blamed both the UK for its then lax asylum rules/law, and the EU for not having a uniform immigration policy. The problem's cause célèbre nature even lead to journalists being detained as they followed migrants onto railway property.

In 2002, the European Commission told France that it was in breach of European Union rules on the free transfer of goods because of the delays and closures as a result of its poor security. The French government built a double fence, at a cost of £5 million, reducing the numbers of migrants detected each week reaching Britain on goods trains from 250 to almost none. Other measures included CCTV cameras and increased police patrols. At the end of 2002, the Sangatte centre was closed after the UK agreed to absorb some migrants.

On 23 and 30 June 2015, striking workers associated with MyFerryLink damaged sections of track by burning car tires, cancelling all trains and creating a backlog of vehicles. Hundreds seeking to reach Britain attempted to stow away inside and underneath transport trucks destined for the UK. Extra security measures included a £2 million upgrade of detection technology, £1 million extra for dog searches, and £12 million (over three years) towards a joint fund with France for security surrounding the Port of Calais.

Illegal attempts to cross and deaths
In 2002, a dozen migrants died in crossing attempts. In the two months from June to July 2015, ten migrants died near the French tunnel terminal, during a period when 1,500 attempts to evade security precautions were being made each day.

On 6 July 2015, a migrant died while attempting to climb onto a freight train while trying to reach Britain from the French side of the Channel. The previous month an Eritrean man was killed under similar circumstances.

During the night of 28 July 2015, one person, aged 25–30, was found dead after a night in which 1,500–2,000 migrants had attempted to enter the Eurotunnel terminal. The body of a Sudanese migrant was subsequently found inside the tunnel. On 4 August 2015, another Sudanese migrant walked nearly the entire length of one of the tunnels. He was arrested close to the British side, after having walked about  through the tunnel.

Mechanical incidents

Fires

There have been three fires in the tunnel, all on the heavy goods vehicle (HGV) shuttles, that were significant enough to close the tunnel, as well as other minor incidents.

On 9 December 1994, during an "invitation only" testing phase, a fire broke out in a Ford Escort car while its owner was loading it onto the upper deck of a tourist shuttle. The fire started at about 10:00, with the shuttle train stationary in the Folkestone terminal, and was put out about 40 minutes later with no passenger injuries.

On 18 November 1996, a fire broke out on an HGV shuttle wagon in the tunnel, but nobody was seriously hurt. The exact cause is unknown, although it was neither a Eurotunnel equipment nor rolling stock problem; it may have been due to arson of a heavy goods vehicle. It is estimated that the heart of the fire reached , with the tunnel severely damaged over , with some  affected to some extent. Full operation recommenced six months after the fire.

On 21 August 2006, the tunnel was closed for several hours when a truck on an HGV shuttle train caught fire.

On 11 September 2008, a fire occurred in the Channel Tunnel at 13:57 GMT. The incident started on an HGV shuttle train travelling towards France. The event occurred  from the French entrance to the tunnel. No one was killed but several people were taken to hospitals suffering from smoke inhalation, and minor cuts and bruises. The tunnel was closed to all traffic, with the undamaged South Tunnel reopening for limited services two days later. Full service resumed on 9 February 2009 after repairs costing €60 million.

On 29 November 2012, the tunnel was closed for several hours after a truck on an HGV shuttle caught fire.

On 17 January 2015, both tunnels were closed following a lorry fire that filled the midsection of Running Tunnel North with smoke. Eurostar cancelled all services. The shuttle train had been heading from Folkestone to Coquelles and stopped adjacent to cross-passage CP 4418 just before 12:30 UTC. 38 passengers and four members of Eurotunnel staff were evacuated into the service tunnel and transported to France in special STTS road vehicles. They were taken to the Eurotunnel Fire/Emergency Management Centre close to the French portal.

Train failures
On the night of 19/20 February 1996, about 1,000 passengers became trapped in the Channel Tunnel when Eurostar trains from London broke down owing to failures of electronic circuits caused by snow and ice being deposited and then melting on the circuit boards.

On 3 August 2007, an electrical failure lasting six hours caused passengers to be trapped in the tunnel on a shuttle.

On the evening of 18 December 2009, during the December 2009 European snowfall, five London-bound Eurostar trains failed inside the tunnel, trapping 2,000 passengers for approximately 16 hours, during the coldest temperatures in eight years. A Eurotunnel spokesperson explained that snow had evaded the train's winterisation shields, and the transition from cold air outside to the tunnel's warm atmosphere had melted the snow, resulting in electrical failures. One train was turned back before reaching the tunnel; two trains were hauled out of the tunnel by Eurotunnel Class 0001 diesel locomotives. The blocking of the tunnel led to the implementation of Operation Stack, the transformation of the M20 motorway into a linear car park.

The occasion was the first time that a Eurostar train was evacuated inside the tunnel; the failing of four at once was described as "unprecedented". The Channel Tunnel reopened the following morning. Nirj Deva, Member of the European Parliament for South East England, had called for Eurostar chief executive Richard Brown to resign over the incidents. An independent report by Christopher Garnett (former CEO of Great North Eastern Railway) and Claude Gressier (a French transport expert) on the 18/19 December 2009 incidents was issued in February 2010, making 21 recommendations.

On 7 January 2010, a Brussels–London Eurostar broke down in the tunnel. The train had 236 passengers on board and was towed to Ashford; other trains that had not yet reached the tunnel were turned back.

Safety
The Channel Tunnel Safety Authority is responsible for some aspects of safety regulation in the tunnel; it reports to the Intergovernmental Commission (IGC).

The service tunnel is used for access to technical equipment in cross-passages and equipment rooms, to provide fresh-air ventilation and for emergency evacuation. The Service Tunnel Transport System (STTS) allows fast access to all areas of the tunnel. The service vehicles are rubber-tired with a buried wire guidance system. The 24 STTS vehicles are used mainly for maintenance but also for firefighting and emergencies. "Pods" with different purposes, up to a payload of , are inserted into the side of the vehicles. The vehicles cannot turn around within the tunnel and are driven from either end. The maximum speed is  when the steering is locked. A fleet of 15 Light Service Tunnel Vehicles (LADOGS) was introduced to supplement the STTSs. The LADOGS has a short wheelbase with a  turning circle, allowing two-point turns within the service tunnel. Steering cannot be locked like the STTS vehicles, and maximum speed is . Pods up to  can be loaded onto the rear of the vehicles. Drivers in the tunnel sit on the right, and the vehicles drive on the left. Owing to the risk of French personnel driving on their native right side of the road, sensors in the vehicles alert the driver if the vehicle strays to the right side.

The three tunnels contain  of air that needs to be conditioned for comfort and safety. Air is supplied from ventilation buildings at Shakespeare Cliff and Sangatte, with each building capable of providing 100% standby capacity. Supplementary ventilation also exists on either side of the tunnel. In the event of a fire, ventilation is used to keep smoke out of the service tunnel and move smoke in one direction in the main tunnel to give passengers clean air. The tunnel was the first main-line railway tunnel to have special cooling equipment. Heat is generated from traction equipment and drag. The design limit was set at , using a mechanical cooling system with refrigeration plants on both sides that run chilled water circulating in pipes within the tunnel.

Trains travelling at high speed create piston effect pressure changes that can affect passenger comfort, ventilation systems, tunnel doors, fans and the structure of the trains, and which drag on the trains. Piston relief ducts of  diameter were chosen to solve the problem, with 4 ducts per kilometre to give close to optimum results. However, this design led to extreme lateral forces on the trains, so a reduction in train speed was required and restrictors were installed in the ducts.

The safety issue of a possible fire on a passenger-vehicle shuttle garnered much attention, with Eurotunnel noting that fire was the risk attracting the most attention in a 1994 safety case for three reasons: the opposition of ferry companies to passengers being allowed to remain with their cars; Home Office statistics indicating that car fires had doubled in ten years; and the long length of the tunnel. Eurotunnel commissioned the UK Fire Research Station—now part of the Building Research Establishment—to give reports of vehicle fires, and liaised with Kent Fire Brigade to gather vehicle fire statistics over one year. Fire tests took place at the French Mines Research Establishment with a mock wagon used to investigate how cars burned. The wagon door systems are designed to withstand fire inside the wagon for 30 minutes, longer than the transit time of 27 minutes. Wagon air conditioning units help to purge dangerous fumes from inside the wagon before travel. Each wagon has a fire detection and extinguishing system, with sensing of ions or ultraviolet radiation, smoke and gases that can trigger halon gas to quench a fire. Since the HGV wagons are not covered, fire sensors are located on the loading wagon and in the tunnel. A  water main in the service tunnel provides water to the main tunnels at  intervals. The ventilation system can control smoke movement. Special arrival sidings accept a train that is on fire, as the train is not allowed to stop whilst on fire in the tunnel unless continuing its journey would lead to a worse outcome. Eurotunnel has banned a wide range of hazardous goods from travelling in the tunnel. Two STTS (Service Tunnel Transportation System) vehicles with firefighting pods are on duty at all times, with a maximum delay of 10 minutes before they reach a burning train.

Unusual traffic

Trains

In 1999, the Kosovo Train for Life passed through the tunnel en route to Pristina, in Kosovo.

Other

In 2009, former F1 racing champion John Surtees drove a Ginetta G50 EV electric sports car prototype from England to France, using the service tunnel, as part of a charity event. He was required to keep to the  speed limit. To celebrate the 2014 Tour de France's transfer from its opening stages in Britain to France in July of that year, Chris Froome of Team Sky rode a bicycle through the service tunnel, becoming the first solo rider to do so. The crossing took under an hour, reaching speeds of —faster than most cross-channel ferries.

Mobile network coverage
Since 2012, French operators Bouygues Telecom, Orange and SFR have covered Running Tunnel South, the tunnel bore normally used for travel from France to Britain.

In January 2014, UK operators EE and Vodafone signed ten-year contracts with Eurotunnel for Running Tunnel North.  The agreements will enable both operators' subscribers to use 2G and 3G services. Both EE and Vodafone planned to offer LTE services on the route; EE said it expected to cover the route with LTE connectivity by the summer of 2014. EE and Vodafone will offer Channel Tunnel network coverage for travellers from the UK to France. Eurotunnel said it also held talks with Three UK but has yet to reach an agreement with the operator.

In May 2014, Eurotunnel announced that they had installed equipment from Alcatel-Lucent to cover Running Tunnel North and simultaneously to provide mobile service (GSM 900/1800 MHz and UMTS 2100 MHz) by EE, O2 and Vodafone. The service of EE and Vodafone commenced on the same date as the announcement. O2 service was expected to be available soon afterwards.

In November 2014, EE announced that it had previously switched on LTE earlier in September 2014. O2 turned on 2G, 3G and 4G services in November 2014, whilst Vodafone's 4G was due to go live later.

Other (non-transport) services
The tunnel also houses the 1,000 MW ElecLink interconnector to transfer power between the British and French electricity networks. During the night of 31 August/1 September 2021, the 51km-long 320 kV DC cable was switched into service for the first time.

See also
 France–UK border
 British Rail Class 373
 Irish Sea tunnel
 Japan–Korea Undersea Tunnel
 List of transport megaprojects
 Marmaray Tunnel
 Samphire Hoe
 Strait of Gibraltar crossing

References

Sources

Further reading

  Article on a post-WW1 plan for a tunnel that was scrapped by the Great Depression. A total cost figure of 150 million was given in 1929
  Autobiography of Sir John Stokes regarding 1882 deliberations

External links

 UK website at eurotunnel.com
 French website at eurotunnel.com/fr
 Tribute website  at chunnel.com

 Channel Tunnel on OpenStreetMap wiki

Tunnels completed in 1994
Coastal construction
Eurostar
France–United Kingdom border crossings
Railway tunnels in England
Railway tunnels in France
Rail transport in France
Rail transport in England
Transport in Kent
Transport in Folkestone and Hythe
Undersea tunnels in Europe
International tunnels
International railway lines
Transport in Pas-de-Calais
Standard gauge railways in England
Standard gauge railways in France
Railway lines opened in 1994
Buildings and structures in Pas-de-Calais
1994 establishments in France
1994 establishments in England
25 kV AC railway electrification
English Channel
Dual-tube railway tunnels

Channel Tunnel


The University of Hawaii is a group of public colleges and universities in Hawaii established in 1907. There are three universities, seven community colleges, an employment training center, four education centers and some research laboratories:

Universities
University of Hawaii at Hilo, doctoral university in Hilo
University of Hawaii at Manoa, doctoral university in Honolulu
University of Hawaii-West Oahu, baccalaureate university in Kapolei

Community Colleges
Hawaii Community College, Hilo
Honolulu Community College, Honolulu
Kapiolani Community College, Honolulu
Kauai Community College, Līhu'e
Leeward Community College, Pearl City
Windward Community College, Kāne'ohe
University of Hawaii Maui College, Kahului

References

Hawaii

University of Hawaiʻi


The Ford Fiesta is a front wheel drive subcompact/supermini caur manufactured an mercatit bi the Ford Motor Company an biggit in Europe, Brazil, Argentinae, Mexico, Venezuela, Cheenae, Indie an Sooth Africae. The model is mercatit warldwide, includin Japan, Australasie an the Americas.

Bi 2010, the saxt-generation (Mark VI) Fiesta haed been introduced warldwide, includin in the Unitit States an Canadae — makin it the first Fiesta model tae be sauld in North Americae syne 1980.

The Fiesta haes sauld ower saxteen million units syne 1976.

History
In the early 1970s, European demand frae consumers for sma caurs wis risin. Even Ford's smawest model, the Escort, wis a conventional front-ingined, rear wheel drive caur; yet competitors wur launchin smawer, front wheel drive caurs, lik the Fiat 127 an the Peugeot 104. The effects o the 1973 energy crisis wur an aa increasin demand for smawer caurs. BMC (which haed syne merged intae British Leyland) haed entered the mini-caur mercat wi its Mini in 1959, while the Rootes Group haed launcht the ultimately less successfu Hillman Imp in 1963, but times haed moved on an fowk leukin for sma caurs nou wantit practical hatchbacks instead o conventional sedans. GM haed entered the modren supermini mercat wi its conventional Opel Kadett City/Vauxhall Chevette three-door hatchback twins early in 1975.

The oreeginal plans for the "Bobcat" wis actually signed aff bi Henry Ford on 15 September 1972, mair nor a year afore the Arab-Israeli War an the oil price surge that it triggered, sae the project is best seen as a response tae competitors than as a direct response tae the oil crisis.  The plans specified a desire that the new caur cost US$100 less tae produce than the Ford Escort. In addition, the caur wis tae hae a wheelbase langer than that o the Fiat 127, but wi oweraw lenth shorter than that o Ford's Escort. The final proposal wis put thegither bi Tom Tjaarda at Ghia.

Bobcat wis approved in the Hairst o 1973, wi Ford's ingineerin centres in Cologne an Dunton (Essex) collaboratin. Customer clinics wur held athort Europe, targetin female buyers in parteecular.

Ford estimatit that 500,000 Fiestas a year wad be produced, an biggit an aw-new  factory near Valencia, Spain; a transaxle factory near Bordeaux, Fraunce; factory extensions for the assembly plants in Dagenham, Essex, an Saarlouis, Germany. Final assembly an aa teuk place in Valencie.

References

1976 introductions
Fiesta
Subcompact caurs
Hatchbacks
Sedans
Euro NCAP superminis
Hot Hatch
Sports sedans
Ford B3 platform
Rally caurs
Caurs o Spain
Vehicles wi CVT transmission
Front-wheel-drive vehicles
Guids manufactured in Germany
1970s automobiles
1980s automobiles
1990s automobiles
2000s automobiles
2010s automobiles

Ford Fiesta


A cupcake (also British English: fairy cake; Australian English: patty cake or cup cake,) is a small cake designed to be eaten by one person. They are often baked in a small thin paper or aluminum cup. Like larger cakes, frosting and other cake decorations, such as sprinkles, are common on cupcakes. They are often sweet and include frosting. Some specialized bakeries sell only cupcakes.

History

The first cupcake could be traced back to 1796. A recipe for "a cake to be baked in small cups" was written in American Cookery by Amelia Simmons. The earliest use of the term cupcake was in "Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats" in 1828 in Eliza Leslie's Recipes cookbook.

In the early 19th century, there were two different uses for the name cup cake or cupcake. Before muffin tins were widely available, the cakes were often baked in individual pottery cups, ramekins, or molds. They got their name from the cups they were baked in. The name "fairy cake" is a description of its size. It would be appropriate for a party of small fairies to share a fairy cake. English fairy cakes vary in size more than American cupcakes. They are normally smaller and are rarely topped with much icing.

The other kind of "cup cake" referred to a cake whose ingredients were measured by volume. They were measured using a standard-sized cup instead of being weighed. Recipes with ingredients that were measured using a standard-sized cup could also be baked in cups. They were more commonly baked in tins. In later years, when the use of volume measurements was more used in home kitchens, these recipes became known as 1234 cakes or quarter cakes. They were called this because they are made up of four ingredients: one cup of butter, two cups of sugar, three cups of flour, and four eggs. They are plain yellow cakes that are less rich and less expensive than pound cake. This is because they use about half as much butter and eggs compared to pound cake. The names of these two major classes of cakes were to tell the baker whether to measure by volume or weight.

References

Cakes

Cupcake


In computin the term computin platform refers tae the environs that a allous a piece o saftware tae be executit. It mey refer tae the computer haurdware, operatin seestem (OS), or wab brouser an thair associatit application programmin interfaces. It mey also refer tae other saftware whan that saftware is providin unnerpinnin structurs for the main program. Computin platforms hae differin abstraction levels, includin a computer architectur, an OS, or runtime libraries.

See also
 Cross-platform

References

Computin platform


Bribery means offering something (such as money) to a person in return for some favour which is bad in some way.

The money that is offered is called a bribe, and the verb is to bribe. Active bribery is offering payment and asking for favour, and passive bribery is asking for payment and offering favour. It is still called bribery if the trade is never done.

It is sometimes difficult to decide whether something is a bribe or just a reward. If a father pays his son for washing the car, that is just a reward or payment. However, if a parent pays a child for eating up its dinner, that might be thought of as a bribe because most people would think that is not right.

Bribery can be a crime in more serious cases, such as when a person offers money to hide their own wrongdoing. If a motorist is caught speeding by a policeman and offers the policeman money or a bottle of vodka to persuade him not to report him, that is bribery. If someone wants to take something into a country that is forbidden (or that they would have to pay tax on), they might offer the customs officer a bribe to persuade him to let them through. Some corrupt people will not do their jobs at all (like delivering some package) unless they get a bribe on top of their normal pay.

Those examples are clearly illegal (against the law) and are rare in many countries, but bribery is quite common in business in many parts of the world. It is difficult to do anything without offering bribes in these places. Giving business people presents in the hope that they will want to do business with you may just seem like good manners at times, but in some cases, it may seem more like bribery.

People who are found to be taking bribes can sometimes lose their jobs. In some cases (like the case of the motorist), bribery is against the law.

Related pages
 Transparency International
 Blackmail

References

Financial crimes

Bribery


is a short way of saying of "Costume Play". It is an act of dressing up to look like an anime, manga, video game, Japanese rock,  or K-pop character. A person who does this is called a Cosplayer.

Cosplay can be divided into two parts, basic cosplay and masquerade cosplay. Both types of cosplay involve trying to physically look like the character, including speaking like the character and memorizing quotes. Masquerading, or "The Masquerade," usually refers to a cosplay competition where cosplayers demonstrate their skills in creating costumes, putting on skits, and in technical matters.

Even though cosplaying comes from Japan, there are a number of cosplay communities in Malaysia, China, the United States, UK, Indonesia, and the Philippines, because of the popularity of Japanese animation, movies, and popular culture in those countries.

Cosplay communities often hold events such as parties and conventions. Some of the best cosplayers can be famous amongst otaku.

References

Anime
Cosplay

Cosplay


The Hon.  Charlotte Bingham (born 29 June 1942) is an English novelist who has written over 30 mainly historical romance novels and has also written for many television programmes including Upstairs, Downstairs; Play for Today; and Robin's Nest. In her television work, she often worked with her husband, Terence Brady.

Biography

Early life
The Honourable Charlotte Mary Thérèse Bingham was born on 29 June 1942 in Haywards Heath, Sussex. Her father, John Bingham, 7th Baron Clanmorris, wrote detective stories and was a secret member of MI5. Her mother, Madeleine Bingham, née Madeleine Mary Ebel, was a playwright and biographer. Bingham first attended a school in London, but from the age of seven to 16, she went to the Priory of Our Lady's Good Counsel school in Haywards Heath. After she left school, Bingham went to stay in Paris with some French aristocrats with the intention of learning French. She had written since she was 10 years old and her first piece of work was a thriller called Death's Ticket. Bingham wrote her humorous autobiography, called Coronet Among the Weeds, when she was 19, and not long before her twentieth birthday a literary agent discovered her celebrating at the Ritz. He was a friend of her parents and he took off the finished manuscript of her autobiography. In 1963, this was published by Heinemann and was a best seller.

TV work
In 1966, Charlotte Bingham's first novel, Lucinda, was published. This was later adapted into a TV screenplay. Coronet Among the Grass, her second autobiography (1972), dealt with the first ten years of her marriage to fellow writer Terence Brady. The couple, who have two children, later adapted Coronet Among the Grass and Coronet Among the Weeds, into the TV sitcom No, Honestly. Bingham and her husband collaborated on the scripts for three early episodes of Upstairs, Downstairs, "Board Wages", "I Dies from Love" and "Out of the Everywhere". They later wrote an accompanying book called Rose's Story. They also wrote the episodes of Take Three Girls featuring Victoria (Liza Goddard). In the 1970s, Brady and Bingham wrote episodes for the TV series Play for Today, Three Comedies of Marriage, Yes, Honestly and Robin's Nest. During the 1980s and 1990s, they continued to write for the occasional TV series and adapted Jilly Cooper's novel Riders for the television film Riders (1993).

Later work
Since the 1980s, Bingham has become a romantic novelist, writing novels including To Hear a Nightingale, The Business and In Sunshine or in Shadow. Most of her books are set in the 19th and 20th centuries. In 1996, she won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award from the Romantic Novelists' Association.

Bibliography

Non fiction
 Coronet Among the Weeds (1963)
 Coronet Among the Grass (1972)
 MI5 And Me (2018)
 Spies and Stars: MI5, Showbusiness and Me (2019)

Novels
 Lucinda (1966)
 The Business (1989)
 In Sunshine or in Shadow (1991)
 Stardust (1992)
 Nanny (1993)
 Change of Heart (1994)
 Grand Affair (1997)
 Love Song (1998)
 The Kissing Garden (1999)
 Country Wedding (1999)
 The Blue Note (2000)
 The Love Knot (2000)
 Summertime (2001)
 Distant Music (2002)
 The Magic Hour (2005)
 Friday's Girl (2005)
 Out of the Blue (2006)
 In Distant Fields (2006)
 The White Marriage (2007)
 Goodnight Sweetheart (2007)
 The Enchanted (2008)
 The Land of Summer (2008)
 The Daisy Club (2009)

Love Quartet
 Belgravia (1983)
 Country Life (1985)
 At Home (1986)
 By Invitation (1993)

Nightingale Saga
 To Hear a Nightingale (1988)
 The Nightingale Sings (1996)

Debutantes Saga
 Debutantes (1995)
 The Season (2001)

The Bexham Trilogy
 The Chestnut Tree (2002)
 The Wind Off the Sea (2003)
 The Moon at Midnight (2003)

Eden Saga
 Daughters of Eden (2004)
 The House of Flowers (2004)

Mums on the Run Series
 Mums on the Run (2010)
 A Dip Before Breakfast (2012)

With Terence Brady

Victoria Series
 Victoria (1972)
 Victoria and Company (1974)

Honestly Series
 No, Honestly (1974)
 Yes, Honestly (1977)

Upstairs, Downstairs Series
 Rose's Story (1972)

References and sources

External links

1942 births
Living people
Daughters of barons
English historical novelists
English romantic fiction writers
English television writers
British women screenwriters
English screenwriters
People from Haywards Heath
English women novelists
British women television writers
20th-century English novelists
21st-century British novelists
20th-century English women writers
21st-century English women writers
Women romantic fiction writers
Women historical novelists

Charlotte Bingham


A bowler is a person who bowls or delivers a ball to the batsman in the game of cricket. Unlike the pitcher in a game of baseball, a bowler delivers with a straight arm (see photo). A ball bowled with the elbow bent is a throw, and that is illegal. If the bowler bowls while not in the right part of the nonstriker's ground, or bowls the ball out of the reach of the striking batter, that is also illegal. Illegal bowling gives the batting team 1 point, mostly can't get players out, and doesn't count toward the limit on the number of deliveries in the game.

A bowler who can also bat well, is called an all rounder. There are different types of bowler, and a cricket team will usually have a mix of different types.

Fast bowler
A fast bowler uses simple speed to defeat a batsman. They can send the ball to the batsman at a speed of 145 km/h. They take a long run up before bowling each ball to build speed. Shoaib Akhtar of Pakistan was the first to bowl at a speed of 160 km/h. Another famous fast bowler is Australian Brett Lee.

Medium pace bowler

A medium pace bowler bowls more slowly. They often use other tricks to defeat the batsman. They can get the ball able to curve in the air or change the speed or length (where the ball hits the ground) to fool the batsman. Some are very accurate so they can repeatedly send the ball to a place which forces the batsman to defend rather than scoring runs. Others grip the ball so that it lands on its seam; this makes the path of the ball unpredictable.

Spin bowler
A spin bowler usually bowls quite slowly and puts a lot of spin on the ball which makes it bounce at an angle off the ground. This makes the batsman play each ball carefully. Generally spin bowlers give up the most runs but they all have "tricks" that they use to fool the batsman and get him or her out. These tricks are given names such as the arm ball, googly, flipper, topspinner or doosra. Spin bowling is very much about fooling the batsman rather than speed. A fast off spin is the normal off spin action but with more pace. Off spin is when the cricket ball spins towards a right-handed batsmen's bat (bowler's left to right). With more pace, there usually is less turn (amount of spin). Off-spin is also called an off-break or finger spin. A famous spin bowler was the Australian Shane Warne, but his type was the leg break, which uses the wrist to spin the ball from the bowler's right to left. This is varied with the top spin, when the ball comes on straight and low.

References

Cricket

Bowler


Noble Energy, Inc. () of Houston, Texas is the modern name of Noble Affiliates Inc., by which it was known through the 1990s, and it is now an oil and natural gas exploration and production company with almost US$3 billion in income at #660 on the 2007 Fortune 1000 list of the largest American companies.

In 1985, Noble Affiliates started its subsidiary Noble Drilling Corporation () to shareholders, and that company in turn went public by the early 1990s, and then became Noble Corporation, an S&P 500 company.

In South America, the company operates in Argentina and Ecuador. In Africa, Noble Energy operates in Equatorial Guinea. And in Eurasia, it operates in the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea and China.

References

Companies based in Houston

Noble Energy


The Carro Armato M13/40 was an Italian World War II tank designed to replace the M11/39 in the Royal Italian Army at the start of World War II. It was the primary tank used by the Italians throughout the war. The design was influenced by the British Vickers 6-Ton and was based on the modified chassis of the earlier M11/39. Production of the M11/39 was cut short in order to get the M13/40 into production. The name refers to "M" for Medio (medium) according to the Italian tank weight standards at the time, 13 tonnes was the scheduled weight and 1940 the initial year of production.

Specifications
The M13 was constructed of riveted steel plates as follows: 30 mm front (as the M11), 42 mm on turret front (30 mm for the M11), 25 mm on the sides (the M11 had only 15 mm), 6 mm bottom (making it very vulnerable to mines) and 15 mm on top. The crew of four were housed in a forward fighting compartment, with the engine at the rear and transmission at the front. The driver and machine-gunner/radio operator were in the hull, with the commander/gunner and the loader in the turret.

The Vickers-derived running gear had two bogie trucks with eight pairs of small wheels on each side, using leaf-spring suspension. The tracks were conventional skeleton steel plate links, and were relatively narrow. Together, this system was thought to allow good mobility in the mountainous areas in which future combat was expected. In the desert where most M13s were actually employed, mobility was less satisfactory. The tank was powered by a  diesel engine. This was an innovation that many countries had yet to introduce, as diesel engines were the future for tanks, with lower cost, greater range and reduced danger of fire compared to petrol engines.

The tank's main armament was a 47 mm gun, a tank mounted version of the successful Cannone da 47/32 M35 anti-tank gun. It could pierce about  of armour at ; this was sufficient to penetrate the British light and cruiser tanks it faced in combat, though not the heavier infantry tanks. One hundred and four rounds of mixed armour-piercing and high explosive ammunition were carried. The M13 was also armed with three or four machine-guns: one coaxially with the main gun and two in the forward, frontal ball mount. A fourth machine gun was sometimes carried in a flexible mount on the turret roof for anti-aircraft use. Two periscopes were available for the gunner and commander, and a Magneti Marelli RF1CA radio was also fitted as standard equipment.

Operational use
The M13/40 was used in the Greek campaign in 1940 and 1941 and in the North African Campaign. The M13/40 was not used on the Eastern Front; Italian forces there were equipped only with L6/40s and Semovente 47/32s. Beginning in 1942, the Italian Army recognised the firepower weakness of the M13/40 series and employed the Semovente 75/18 self-propelled gun alongside the tanks in their armoured units.

First actions
The first of over 700 M13/40s were delivered following a rate of production of about 60–70 a month, before the fall of 1940. They were sent to North Africa to fight the British; however, most units were hastily formed (and thus lacked cohesion), the tanks had not been fitted with radios (giving them a serious tactical disadvantage even against inferior enemies) and their crews had almost no training (in 1940 the crews were given 25 days of actual tank training and then sent to the front). The baptism of fire came with a special unit, the Babini Group. Arriving too late to fight in the September offensive, this unit was ready the next December, for Operation Compass, a British offensive. Tanks of III battalion were present at the Battle of Bardia, where in two days of fighting (January 3–4, 1941) the Australians suffered 456 casualties while the Italians lost 40,000 men (2,000 killed, 3,000 wounded and 36,000 captured). Further action took place in Derna, where the V battalion had just arrived. On February 6–7, the British offensive penetrated so far that the Babini Group sought to open a breach in the British lines at the Battle of Beda Fomm in an effort to allow cut-off Italian troops to retreat along the Libyan coast. The attacks failed and all of their tanks were lost. The last six surviving tanks entered a field near the local British command post. They were destroyed one after another by a single 2-pounder (40 mm) anti-tank gun. Many tanks were lost in this campaign to artillery fire rather than other tanks. A number of captured M11 and M13 tanks were re-used by the Australian 2/6th Cavalry Regiment and the British 6th Royal Tank Regiment, until the spring of 1941, when their fuel ran out and they were destroyed.

The M13 also fought in Greece, in difficult terrain and in April 1941, M13s of the 132nd Armoured Division Ariete took part in the Siege of Tobruk, with little success against British Matilda II tanks. Ariete had more success with the M13 in the action at Bir el Gubi against the Crusader tanks of the British 22nd Armoured Brigade.

Later use in the desert war

In April 1941, at the time of the arrival of the Afrika Korps, the Italians had around 240 M13 and M14 tanks in first-line service. In 1942, as the Allies began deploying M3 Lee/Grant medium tanks and Crusader Mk IIIs, along with towed 6-pounder (57 mm) anti-tank guns in their infantry units, the weaknesses of the M13 were exposed. In an attempt to improve protection, many crews piled sandbags or extra track links on the outside of their tanks, but this made the already-underpowered vehicles even slower and increased maintenance requirements; such practice, while popular, was discouraged by the commanders for the same reason.  The Italians equipped at least one company in each tank battalion with more heavily armed Semovente 75/18 assault guns.

The Second Battle of El Alamein saw the first appearance of the M4 Sherman, while some 230 M13s were still in front line service. In several days of battle, the Ariete and Littorio divisions were used to cover the Axis retreat. The Centauro Division was virtually destroyed fighting in Tunisia. By then, the M13/40 and the M14/41 were completely surpassed, and their armament was all but useless against the enemy's M3 Lee and M4 Sherman medium tanks at all but point-blank range, while both could easily destroy an M13/40 from a distance; they resorted to firing at the suspensions and the tracks, and to rely on fire support by the Semoventi and artillery.

Postwar use
During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, two or three M13/40s which were left behind in North Africa were incorporated into the Egyptian armed forces. These were used during the Battles of Negba, where one was knocked out and subsequently captured by Israeli troops. For a few years after the war, the tank remained in the Negba kibbutz as a monument to the battle.

Characteristics
The M13/40 was a conventional light tank of the early war period, similar in capability to other Vickers-derived designs such as the Polish 7TP and Soviet T-26. While being virtually impotent against the heavily armoured British Matilda II, at a weight of 13 tons it carried armour comparable to most of its opponents of 1940–41 and its 47 mm long-barrelled gun was effective against many other British tanks of 1940–41, which were similarly armoured to the M13 but carried 2pdr (40 mm) guns with shorter range and inferior ballistic performance. At that time, most German tanks were armed with 20 mm, 37 mm guns or 50 mm and 75 mm low velocity guns. Only after 1942 did the Germans start the widespread adoption of weapons of 50 mm and 75 mm calibre long barrelled guns with high enough velocity for adequate anti-tank use, which gave the M13/40s gun an advantage over comparable German tanks in the early war. The adoption of the 47 mm long gun was probably the best feature of the M13. Due to its relatively large calibre, the main gun's HE round was also very useful against towed guns and infantry, and eliminated or at least mitigated, for the first years of war, the need for a dedicated support vehicle such as the Wehrmacht had in the early Panzer IV and Stug III. The diesel engine was an advantage, and the simplicity of production suited the state of Italian industry.

The tank also had many shortcomings which severely hampered its effectiveness on the battlefield: the engine provided good range, but not great power and reliability. The M13's engine was the same as the M11/39 but the newer tank was heavier, which resulted in lower speed and more strain on the powerplant. The suspension and tracks were reliable, but resulted in relatively low speeds, not much better than infantry tanks such as the Matilda. Armament was sufficient for 1940–41 but did not keep up with the increased armour and firepower on Allied or German tanks. The method of construction, using rivets, was outdated. Most tanks of the era were switching to the use of welding for construction, since rivets can shear off when hit, becoming additional projectiles inside the tank. The two-man turret was less efficient in combat than the three-man turrets used in many other tanks of the era. Radios were not fitted to many tanks.

Italian historians Filippo Cappellano and Pier Paolo Battistelli have pointed out that the disappointing performance of the tank early in the war, where its armament was by no means inadequate, can be ascribed to its crews' almost complete lack of training (the first tank training centre was created only in 1941) and experience, coupled with poor tactical doctrine, the lack of radios, and the fact that many units were hastily created and sent to the battlefield, and also to the lack of armoured recovery vehicles; they state that, while the training and experience of the Italian crews improved during the conflict, their tanks' technical disadvantage worsened. In such a condition, they marvel that the Italian tanks were able to fight for as long as they did.

Variants
The M13/40 series was Italy's most-produced tank of the war with over 3,000 having been built, including later variants such as the M14/41. It was equipped with a more powerful engine as well as better air filters for operations in North Africa. The last version was the M15/42 tank produced in 1943, with a better petrol engine and a longer 47/40 gun. It also had thicker armour than the previous models. The Semovente 75/18 self-propelled gun was built by utilizing the M13/40 or M14/41 chassis.

The Semovente Comando M40 was an M13/40 tank with the turret replaced by a large multi-piece hatch. The hull housed additional radios and other communication equipment.

References
Notes

Bibliography

Further reading

External links

M13/40, M14/41 Medium Tanks  at wwiivehicles.com
M13/40  at onwar.com

World War II tanks of Italy
Medium tanks of Italy
Gio. Ansaldo & C. armored vehicles
Military vehicles introduced from 1940 to 1944

M13/40 tank


Baalbek Destrict () is an admeenistrative destrict in the Beqaa Govrenorate o the Republic o Lebanon, haein Baalbek as its caipital. It is bi far the lairgest destrict in the kintra comprisin a total o 2319 km2.

Major touns o the destrict are Hallanieh, Tamnine, shmestar, Douris, Yanta, Jdeide, an Kasarnaba.

Destricts o Lebanon
Baalbek Destrict

Baalbek Destrict