The Mont Blanc Tunnel

Witness History

BBC

History, Society & Culture, Personal Journals

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 17 July 2017

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In July 1965 an 11-km tunnel dug deep beneath the Alps was opened to traffic. Linking France and Italy, the Mont Blanc tunnel was a remarkable feat of engineering. Franco Cuaz, a consultant on the project and the tunnel's first operations manager, speaks to Mike Lanchin about the risks and challenges of the ambitious project.

Photo: Final preparations are made for the opening of the Mont Blanc Tunnel on the French-Italian border, July 1965. (Keystone/Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless
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0:21.0	And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less
0:24.9	searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds just before this
0:30.3	BBC podcast gets underway here's something you may not know.
0:34.4	My name's Linda Davies and I commission podcast for BBC Sounds.
0:38.3	As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely
0:46.0	engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,
0:54.2	poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories.
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0:59.4	If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected.
1:02.6	Find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds.
1:05.8	Hello and welcome to the Witness Podcast, History Made by the People Who Were There.
1:10.6	I'm Mike Lanchin, and today we're going back to July of 1965 and the
1:16.1	completion of an engineering marvel. The 11 kilometer long Mont Blanc tunnel
1:21.5	had been dug under the highest mountains of the Alps
1:24.3	linking France and Italy. I've been hearing from one of the engineers who helped make
1:28.8	it happen. It's July 19th, 1965, almost four decades have passed since the very first drilling began into the Alps and at last the Mont Blanc
	...

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