The Norwegian government has backed an ambitious plan to create the world's first ship tunnel. But why has nobody tackled this engineering feat before?
At 45m high (148ft) and 36m (118ft) wide, the 1.7km (one mile) long Stad Ship Tunnel will be the only one of its kind - a passage through solid rock able to accommodate 16,000 tonne freight and passenger ships.
Ship canals have long been used to make journeys more direct and safer but the Stad peninsula is a mountainous divide, peaking at 645m, between the Norwegian Sea to the north and the North Sea to the south.
Am I wrong to think the waves and wind inside a tunnel like this would be insane? And wouldn't ships be smacking themselves against the walls?
Am I wrong for kind of wanting to see that? In IMAX?
If I recall, the entrance and exit of the tunnel are inside a fjord, with much less weather, and it avoids the nastiest part of the Norwegian coast. I would imagine too that the there would have to be some ridiculous surf and wind to affect things a half a kilometer into a tunnel. The experts don’t seem too concerned about it.