FCC has completed the excavation of the left tube of the Sorbas Tunnel on the Murcia-Almeria High-Speed Line along the Sorbas-Barranco de los Gafarillos section.

The tunnel is approximately 7.5 kilometers long, totaling 98.7 percent of the full length of this section. This is the Andalusia's largest railway tunnel, larger than the two-tube Aldalajis (Málaga) tunnel. The Sorbas-Barranco de los Gafarillos section runs fully through the municipality of Sorbas, in the province of Almeria.

The tunnel boring machine called Alcazaba which previously bored the right tube on March 15th last has been used for excavating the left tube. As of 15 March, work began on dismantling this machinery to move it to the north opening and erect the machine to start the work on the second tube, in a North-South direction. The boring work on this tube commenced on July 15, 2011 and has taken six months, two months less than it took to bore the first tube.

The Sorbas tunnel is comprised of two single-track tubes, each of a 52 m2 free cross-section, with a 26 m median strip, whilst the maximum longitudinal slope of the tunnel is 12.5%.

Almería-Murcia High-Speed

The Almería-Murcia High-Speed line is 185 km long, not counting the accesses to Murcia. A total of 108 kilometers of its full length run through the province of Almería, the other 76.4 kilometers running through the Autonomous Community of Murcia.

Two way stations are planned to be built in Lorca (Murcia) and Vera-Almanzora (Almeria), as well as the future America station, as part of the works for integrating the railway system into the city.

In this project, a number of measures have been taken into account for guaranteeing utmost respect for the environment, these measures being included in the Environmental Impact Statement. One example of these measures is the elimination of debris dumps so as to avoid affecting the aquifers in the area, the protection and collection of spur-thighed tortoises.