Sydney Metro West’s tunnel boring machines (TBMs), Daphne and Beatrice, have become the first TBMs in the southern hemisphere to complete a double breakthrough.
At the end of 2023, the TBMs broke through a rock wall and arrived at Five Dock Metro Station. This marks a major milestone in Sydney Metro West’s project to build twin 24-kilometre metro tunnels between Westmead and the Sydney CBD.
With this breakthrough, the TBMs have completed the 4.3-kilometre section of metro tunnel from The Bays to Five Dock, which took around seven months.
To date, Daphne and Beatrice have each excavated 437,463 tonnes of material and installed about 30,732 precast concrete segments lining the new tunnel walls.
Prior to the arrival of the TBMs, the Five Dock station cavern was excavated and around 286,047 tonnes of material was removed to create the underground structure. The cavern is 22 metres wide and 30 metres deep.
The 1,300-tonne TBMs are now travelling to the western end of the station cavern, before being relaunched to continue their journey to Sydney Olympic Park.
While in the cavern, the TBMs are undergoing all necessary maintenance.
The next stop for the machines will be in the Burwood North Metro Station site, which is about 2 kilometres away.
