Starting pit ready for Seattle tunnel boring machine; Berth being reassembled for 2-mile dig

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
May 15, 2013 - 12:23 pm EDT

SEATTLE — Bertha's bed is ready.

Seattle Tunnel Partners finished building a pit — 80 feet deep and 400 feet long — that will serve as the launch pad for a huge boring machine called Bertha.

The Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce reports (http://bit.ly/101heej ) the 7,000-ton machine that arrived in pieces aboard a ship from Japan is being reassembled in the pit.

Drilling on a two-mile Highway 99 tunnel under downtown Seattle starts this summer. The tunnel is expected to open in 2015, allowing the removal of the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

Information from: Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce, http://www.djc.com/

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