All language subtitles for Impossible Engineering s06e01 Beasts of the Bayou.eng

This time on
"Impossible engineering,"

extreme railroads.

Railroads of the water world.

Their unique challenges...

The majority of the surrounding
area is swamp and bayou.

You really can't even see land
on the other side.

And the ingenious solutions...

So this is it.

That's the solution
the engineers found.

It's an incredible effort
to do that.

Undoubtedly,
this is the most challenging

engineering project
ever to have been realized.

That make the impossible...

Possible.

It's difficult to imagine
life before the railroads

when vast expanses of terrain

left some lands
laying undiscovered.

Since the 19th century,
engineers have taken on

some of the planet's
harshest landscapes...

Building railroads
to cross countries

and connect remote communities.

But there's one environment

that presents
an almost impossible challenge.

Engineers have fought
their hardest battles

to overcoming our water worlds.

Just have a look around.

Incredible terrain here.
So many challenges.

The atmosphere is
really moist and really salty.

Corrosion in certain areas
is absolutely massive.

The difference
of level... about 70 meters.

It needed some very special
engineering process

to solve the problem.

And at the end
of the 19th century,

it was one giant stretch
of water in the U.S.

That would prove profoundly
challenging for engineers.

Louisiana... it's a region
that's characterized

by its wet, swampy geography.

In the late 1800s,
engineers were challenged

to build a railway
that could connect New York

and San Francisco with
the trading port of New Orleans.

However, an imposing body
of water stood in their way...

Lake Pontchartrain.

Today's a beautiful day,
and the seas are flat calm,

but, uh, I've been
out here with winds

over 50 miles per hour

and seas in excess of 8 feet.

Railroad engineer pat Weldon

has experienced the challenges
of the lake firsthand.

The majority
of the surrounding area

is swamp and bayou.

You know, you'll look across
lake Pontchartrain,

and you really can't even
see land on the other side.

To conquer this formidable
body of water by train

requires a work of engineering
on an equally grand scale.

The lake Pontchartrain trestle.

Stretching 5.8 miles long.

This super-sized
concrete ballast deck bridge

is the longest railway crossing
over water on the planet.

Originally built
entirely from wood,

this record-breaking structure

was completed
over 130 years ago.

Still standing strong
against the elements today,

pat's making his way out
on the water

to carry out
some critical repairs

while his team
is riding the rails

in a specially adapted truck.

All right. Here we go.
Mr. Dave, are you ready?

All clear.

Overcoming the massive distance
across the swampy lake,

the trestle grants the railroad
direct access into New Orleans.

When you grasp
the concept that we're covering

over 5 1/2 miles of lake
with a bridge,

it's just an incredible feat.

And maintaining
this link is vital.

Yeah, we'll start
on the joints first

and get that knocked out.

While splitting
the lake from shore to shore

solved the challenge
for the railroad,

it creates another problem
for boats.

Your vertical clearance

for the majority of the bridge
is very low.

Most boats,
even moderate-sized...

It will be difficult
for them to pass

underneath the ballast deck.

Unloading station here.

To allow both
water and train traffic

to travel the lake
without issue,

the Norfolk Southern railroad

turned to an ingenious
engineering solution.

Spanning 219 feet,

this remarkable piece
of railroad infrastructure

is the key to the Pontchartrain
trestle's success.

The brainchild
of American engineer

William Donald Scherzer.

The rolling bascule is renowned

for its robust,
low-maintenance design,

ideal for operating
in the watery wilds of the lake.

This is a tough place
to get into.

To make repairs is
a difficult thing to do.

There's no other place
on Norfolk Southern

or any other railroad,
for that matter,

that really compares.

To get today's
track maintenance work done,

the bascule's
impressive engineering

needs to kick into gear.

We have machinery
at the top of the bridge

that is powered
by two electric drive motors.

There are two pinions,

and those pinions rotate
across a rack system.

Essentially, what happens
is it applies force

to open the bridge.

By harnessing
the nearly 830-ton mass

of the counterweight

to assist the motors
in lifting the span,

the bridge rolls back
like a giant rocking horse.

This rolling action allows for

a much smoother transfer of load
while the bridge operates.

With railroad
operations now at a standstill,

the team needs to work fast.

How's it look, Jeb?

We had this...
Uh, 2:00 P.M. looks good.

Good deal.
Sounds good.

Facilitating the crossing

of up to 15 freight trains
a day,

the bridge's heavy use
results in wear and tear

to some of its key components.

For example, the miter rails.

These miter rails act as running
rails for our train traffic.

They also allow the drawbridge
to operate up and down

and for those rails to break

when the drawbridge is operated
to the raised position.

Miter rails are composed

of two interconnecting
pieces of track.

When the span opens,

the lift rail slides away
from the stationary rail.

And when the bridge closes,

the two realign
with millimeter precision.

Anytime that we have

a major crack or defect
in the rail,

it either has to be repaired
or it has to be slow ordered.

And a slow order is basically

a speed restriction
that requires us

to reduce the operating speed
of the train.

Today's repairs are
critical, yet straightforward,

but this bridge
has had to withstand

more than simple wear and tear
in its lifetime.

The exposed location
leaves it vulnerable

to the very worst weather
that nature can muster.

This rail line is a vital link

to our gateway
in New Orleans, Louisiana.

If a storm was to damage

or destroy any portion
of this bridge,

it would have a serious impact
on our operations.

It's a nightmare scenario

that the railroad
experienced in 2005

as the southeast was ravaged
by one of the worst storms

in American history...
Hurricane Katrina.

The Pontchartrain railway bridge

actually lost 4.7 miles of
its track and ballast section.

That track was washed off
the bridge deck

and into the bottom of the lake.

Despite
the unprecedented destruction

wrought by Katrina,

the railroad's maintenance teams
fought back.

We used a total of nine
barge-mounted cranes,

and we had a team of divers
that worked with the cranes

to attach rigging to the track

and then pull it up
and back onto the bridge deck.

16 days after the landfall

of one of the worst hurricanes
in modern history,

Norfolk Southern was able
to restore rail service

into New Orleans.

The amount of determination
was nothing short of remarkable.

Since restoring
service across the lake

in the wake of Katrina...

We get this bridge
to the upright position.

You guys planning on
taking it back down?

Yes, sir.
That's correct.

I told them to bring it
right back down.

Okay. Understood.

The Pontchartrain trestle

has continued to act as
a vital link into New Orleans,

and today's repairs are keeping
this railroad on track.

This is northbound train 198.

Every day,
this record-breaking bridge

continues to allow the railroad

to conquer
this vast body of water

and achieve
the seemingly impossible.

This is an amazing
engineering feat,

the construction of this bridge.

And to be able to be part
of that and have some hand

in maintaining the safe
operation of the railroad

is very gratifying.

While railroad engineers

strive to overcome
our water worlds,

some of the most
remarkable achievements

have been realized underwater.

The English channel,

stretching as wide
as 150 miles across.

It's the dividing line
that separates Great Britain

from continental Europe.

Packed with giant ships

and frequently struck
by wild weather,

crossing this
formidable body of water

can present
a daunting challenge.

But in the 1980s,

railroad engineers
from Britain and France

joined forces in an attempt
to conquer the channel by rail.

Here we are,
just to the east of Dover.

The English channel
runs in the distance.

This would have seemed
a virtually impossible task

at the time,

to create a fixed link
between the two countries.

Civil engineer Dave Johnson

has been closely involved
with the ambitious project

since its inception.

One of the options was
to have a bridge going across.

They were talking about
5-kilometer-long spans,

which was massive.

But the idea of bridging
the 18-plus-mile distance

between Folkestone and Calais
was fatally flawed.

We have
the busiest stretch of water

for shipping in the world,

so there would have been a risk
during the construction

and afterwards
that, at some time,

there could have been
a collision

between a ship
and the bridge supports.

In order
to achieve their ambition

and avoid the dangers of
the congested shipping lanes,

engineers reached
a record-breaking solution...

The channel tunnel.

A railroad construction
of epic proportions

carrying both passengers
and freight

between Britain and France
under the sea.

With the option
to board from London...

And terminals at Folkestone
for vehicles to drive on.

The channel tunnel
has turned what was

a 90-minute,
weather-dependent ferry trip

into a simple 35-minute ride
on the rails.

It's easy to
take these things for granted,

but every time I use it,
you can't help wondering what

an amazing bit of infrastructure
that we have here.

This rail network

carries 22 million passengers
a year,

making what was once thought
to be an impossible journey...

Possible.

Here we go.
We're coming out in France now.

There we are.

But realizing
this long-held dream

of connecting the two countries
took a team of 13,000 people

more than five years
to construct.

Massive logistics involved.

We're talking about three
tunnels 50 kilometers in length,

of which 38 kilometers roughly
lies underneath the sea.

This huge tunneling process

took place up to 245 feet
below the sea bed,

working off-shore
from both countries.

Large tunnel-boring machines,

which have
a large rotating head,

with sharp, cutting teeth
to get through the ground,

slowly started to work towards
one another across the channel.

And eventually,
on the 1st of December, 1990,

the two service tunnels met in
the middle for a celebration.

Four years later,
having laid the track

and installed power
to the lines,

the channel tunnel
opened in 1994,

crowning it the longest undersea
railroad tunnel on the planet.

Conquering this most challenging
of environments

was an incredible feat,

but engineers still have to
fight the water world

every single day.

John Keefe is a member
of the team involved

in this mega project.

In engineering terms,

it compares to things
like the Panama canal,

Suez canal, the hoover dam.

It's of the order of magnitude
that has been recognized

as one of the seven wonders
of the modern world.

Undoubtedly, this is the most
challenging engineering project

ever to have been realized.

Around 400 trains pass
through the tunnel each day,

an operation that is
monitored behind the scenes

at channel tunnel HQ.

This is a bit
of an exclusive area.

It's a bit of a secret.

This room is our
railway control center.

It's the heart of the whole
of the channel tunnel.

We basically run everything
from here.

That includes
all of the time tabling

for the railway movements.

A time table
that the maintenance teams

crucially have to work around.

Every week, two nights
of maintenance are scheduled

on Saturday and Sunday night.

We'll take a section
of the tunnel out of service,

and the railway system continues
to operate around them.

Tasked with carrying
out this weekend's vital work

is lead engineer Mark Cornwall.

Now we got about
15 kilometers to the location,

where our train is,
to start work.

Running an
electrically powered railroad

in a damp, undersea environment

presents constantly evolving
challenges.

No one's ever maintained
anything like this before.

We've come up against lots
of different complications.

The atmosphere in certain areas
is really moist and really salty

because you get a lot of
seepage from the sea bed.

The corrosion in certain areas
is absolutely massive.

We have a massive program
in place

of changing out
3 kilometers of the tunnel.

Tonight,
Mark's team is carrying out

a routine inspection
of the contact wires

that run along
the top of the tunnel.

But there's a more
pressing element to the job.

Upgrading a vital component

in the system that delivers
power to the trains,

Mark and the team
must work safe and fast

to finish the job in time
for the morning passengers

to catch their trains

without compromising
the electric rail system.

Mark Cornwall and his team

have been tasked with upgrading
a part of the electrical system

powering the
channel tunnel trains,

and the clock is ticking.

What we're doing tonight
is we're changing out

the registration parts
and feeder parts.

We're changing them
from porcelain to synthetic.

So let's make a start.

Installing
the new synthetic insulators

will reduce the risk
of the damp environment

causing a power failure

that could bring
the railroad to a halt.

On this shift tonight,
we're gonna try to change out

most probably 30 insulators.

When we leave here,
the trains must be able

to run first thing
in the morning.

As you can see,
it's a long procedure

just to do one location.

But six hours later,
it's job well done,

and the tunnel can be put
back into operation once again.

Working in this
unique atmosphere

is all part of an ongoing,
invisible battle

to keep this record-breaking
railroad on track.

I love my job.

I've been here 26 years now,

and this will be where I retire,
I hope.

Making its
epic journey under the sea...

There's a lot of things
I'm quite proud of,

the sheer scale of it.

It's the longest undersea tunnel
in the world.

And achieving the
seemingly impossible every day.

The channel tunnel
is the biggest thing

you'll ever see in my lifetime.

It just don't get any bigger
than this.

In 20 years or 50 years
or 100 years,

there will be something
bigger and better,

but, for now, this is it.

While some railroads are built

to transport trains underwater,

this engineering feat was built
to transport ships across land.

The Panama canal
is one of the planet's

most significant trade routes.

Stretching for 50 miles,

it cuts through
the heart of the country,

connecting the Atlantic ocean
in the north

with the pacific ocean
in the south...

And saving 8,000 nautical miles
per journey for ships

that pass through it
instead of the alternative

and risky route
around cape horn.

Senior lock master
Emilio Liao Lee

is at the Miraflores locks

at the pacific entrance
to the canal,

the unlikely setting for a feat
of railroad engineering.

There is an unbelievably
tiny 23-inch gap

between the walls of the locks

and the sides
of the largest vessels.

And any damage to the locks

could have a catastrophic effect
on world trade.

In the early 1900s,

the task of solving the problem
of guiding ships through

fell to the canal project's

electrical and mechanical
engineer, Edward Schildhauer.

Schildhauer would need
to design a system

that would have enough power
to control the enormous weight

of the fully loaded ships
at they change elevation.

The solution, incredibly,
was a railroad,

and a unique locomotive
known as the Panama mule.

Weighing 47 tons each,
these workhorses run in pairs

to keep the vessels
centrally aligned.

It was a solution
that was so comprehensive

that it's still in use today.

Running along rack rails
parallel to the canal,

a gear on the locomotives
meshes with the rail,

giving them enough traction
to surmount gradients up to 44%.

Mule driver
Roberto Augusto Thompson

is assisting the lockage today.

A small rowboat
then passes the cables

to be attached to the ship,

and then back to land,
where the railroad steps in

to take its fundamental role.

Once the gates have closed,

water rushes in
to elevate the ship.

During the lockage, ships
transit under their own power.

But for the next eight minutes,

the mules have to
ascend the rails

and move in unison
with the vessel

to maintain
enough lateral tension

in the ropes
to keep it centered.

Each locomotive has two
290-horsepower traction units

and is powered by electricity
fed through the tracks.

For large ships, up to
eight mules work together,

each with a driver
sitting in a central cabin

keeping tight control.

But power wasn't
the only challenge to overcome.

These massive ships
left the mules at risk

of being dragged off course.

It would take some
innovative engineering

to keep these mighty workhorses
and megaships on track.

In the Panama canal,
these mules are tasked

with guiding mega cargo ships
safely through the lock.

But what keeps
the little locomotives

from being dragged off course by
the sheer pull of their charges?

This army of
100 unique locomotives

works continuously
throughout the day

with the help of a turntable

moving with the changing
direction of ships

in and out of the pacific,

making it possible
for 14,500 ships

to pass through
the Panama canal each year,

all thanks to Schildhauer's
ingenious railroad.

Overcoming heights in
a water world requires locks,

but sometimes, a more radical
railroad solution is necessary.

It was one such challenge
facing engineers here

in the famously flat landscape
of central Belgium.

In the 1960s,
there was a need to speed up

the vital flow of trade

along a section of the
Charleroi to Brussels canal,

a problem waterways expert
Yvon Loyaerts knows well.

This time consuming,
about two-and-a-half days

for the whole trip from here
to about 20 kilometers further.

Slowing down the cargo

was a steeply sloping section
of the canal...

A cumbersome stretch
of 14 locks,

taking a day to move through.

The difference
of level... about 70 meters.

In fact, it needed some
very special engineering process

to solve the problem.

Incredibly,
it was a radical feat

of railroad engineering
that provided the answer.

Engineers have to be creative.

And so we can mix technologies.
Why not?

What they dreamt up

was the monumental
Ronqui?res inclined plane.

The world's longest
sloping lock...

Almost a mile long...

And 223 feet high.

Boats take to the rails

aboard a pair of huge
water-filled tanks,

conquering the incline

and reducing what was
a seven-hour trip

to just 40 minutes.

The purpose of this construction

was mainly to help us

gaining some time
in terms of using the locks.

As before,
we had many locks to use.

It made the traffic so slow.

Today, guide Arnaud Ketels

is riding the revolutionary
sloping lock

as it helps yet another vessel
pass through the incline.

So, at this moment,
we are bringing a merchant ship

from the upstream
to the downstream

down a slope of 5%.

The system works
in a similar way

to toy boats in a bathtub...

only on a much larger scale.

During a normal week
from Monday to Friday,

we have between
10 and 20 boats a day.

The fact that we can
carry such boats...

1,350 tons of merchandise...

It allows us to spare
70,000 lorries from the world.

Each giant tank, or caisson,

contains over
105,000 cubic feet of water.

In a caisson,

that's 91 meters long

and 12 meters large.

And their movement is driven

by a rail-mounted
counterweight system.

We have two railways...
One for the caisson itself

and one for the counterweights
under the caisson.

This ingenious inclined plane

can transport each tank,
plus the fully loaded barges,

over a world-record distance.

There are other sloping locks
in the world,

but a sloping lock
of 1.4 kilometers...

It's the first inclined plane
of this size.

To make this
impossible concept a reality,

engineers had to get creative

and find some
groundbreaking solutions.

The Ronqui?res inclined plane

is the longest sloping lock
in the world,

and it revolutionized the flow
of cargo in central Belgium.

Yet the mechanism behind
this mode of transport

is brilliantly simple.

First, the barge enters the tank
through a lock gate

that shuts behind it,
trapping water inside.

An electric motor
then hauls a cable,

moving the tank in one direction

and a counterweight
in the other.

At the end of the incline,
a second lock gate opens,

and the barge continues
on its journey.

Yvon is watching the whole
impressive operation unfold

from a unique perspective.

The tank is now going down.

You see all the running wheels
going on the track,

and, of course, naturally,
when the tank is going down,

is running down,
a counterweight will go up.

As the 5,730-ton
weight climbs the slope,

the giant tank of water
carrying the barge

descends at a speed
of 3.9 feet per second.

It is, in fact,
a system as for a cable car.

The only difference is that
it will be bigger, of course.

It's a large difference,
in fact.

Driven by six electric motors,

two winches haul
the eight massive cables

attached to each tank
and its counterweight

over the 223-foot
height difference.

There are
two systems in parallel.

Each system is 16 cables,

more or less
1.5 kilometers as length.

Thus it means a little less
than 50 kilometers' length,

with all the cables.

When it was conceived,
many thought constructing

the epic Ronqui?res inclined
plane would be impossible,

but when it opened in 1968,
after six years of construction,

this railroad transformed
Belgium's canals.

We had to find

some very new solutions
to make it work,

and, luckily,
they were good solutions

because 50 years afterwards,
it still works,

and it's still in use
and on a very efficient manner.

And thanks to this
incredible piece of engineering,

today yet another
boatload of cargo

has saved hours on its journey.

It's an amazing piece
of engineering.

In Belgium,
the Ronqui?res rail system

helps the shipping industry
stay afloat.

In Switzerland,
it's the tourism industry

engineers are looking
to keep on track.

Local Mark Von Weissenfluh
is en route

to one alpine setting

that visitors
desperately wanted to reach.

Tourists from all over the world
came to visit

the area of the Bernese Oberland
and the lake Brienz.

And, of course, they also wanted
to see the Giessbach cascades.

14 cascades going downhill
into the lake.

Thanks to its remote,
almost island-like location,

the only way to access
this beautiful spot was by boat,

but even then, an arduous
hike up a 328-foot incline

and across the area's
iconic waterfalls

stood between visitors
and the opulent hotel above.

So this is it.

That's the solution
the engineers did find.

They created
the Giessbach funicular.

This historic
funicular opened in 1879,

turning what was once
an impossible journey

into an awe-inspiring,
1,130-foot-long ride by rail.

This is one of my most

spectacular journeys up here.

Every time
you drive up this hill,

it's like being 140 years
thrown back in time.

It's just very impressive.

Where a steam
locomotive of the time

lost traction
on gradients beyond 5%,

this traverses
a mighty 28% gradient,

overcoming the fast-flowing
falls in the process.

But to work around
this watery landscape

posed an enormous challenge,

not least
how to power the funicular.

Tasked with the job

was Swiss engineer
Carl Roman Abt.

In a funicular system,

one car goes up
while another goes down,

the weight of the two carriages
counterbalancing each other.

But additional power
is needed to exceed

the counterbalance
and create motion.

Abt needed to find
an impossible solution

to power this massive system
in the heart of the Swiss alps,

but he didn't have to look far
to find the answer.

Swiss engineer Carl Abt

needed to find a way to power

his exquisite counterbalanced
funicular system

in the remote alpine setting
of Giessbach.

Inspired by the spectacular
water world around him,

Abt used water from the falls

to weight the upper carriage
and induce motion.

The water flows
over to the tank,

which was underneath the cabin,

so the car
was filled with water,

and the extra power
has been here to generate

the pulling up
of the second wagon

down by the lake
and get the passengers up.

Very easy, very simple.

Having found a
solution to power his funicular,

Abt now faced the task

of building the track
that would carry it.

Early designs featured
two tracks side by side,

but space and budget

would impose
impossible restrictions here.

So, looking at that hill,

we can see the challenge
behind it.

The cars have to conquer
that steep hill,

and it was only budget
for one track.

But the cable car, of course,

it has two cars,
so how to do that?

There had to be a genius of an
engineer to come up with an idea

to create a solution
with one track and two cars.

Abt's space-
and cost-saving solution

was to design
a single-track funicular

with an ingenious passing loop,
allowing two trains

to travel up and down
the mountain simultaneously.

So, it's called the Abt switch.

The cars can cross
halfway up the hill,

and we have just one track

all the way up the hill
from the bottom.

Traditional train wheels

have a flange on the inside
to keep them on the rails.

Abt designed his wheels
so that both edges

were flanged on one side
of the carriage,

and on the other side,
the wheels are simply rounded.

The flanged side follows
an uninterrupted guidance rail.

As the carriage approaches
the Abt switch,

the rail diverts it
to the outer edge,

allowing the two carriages
to pass each other.

That's
the first time in the world

it has been realized
on a funicular.

So when you look around

and you see
that incredible terrain here,

it was just logical

to create that solution
with only one track.

Abt's single-track
solution was groundbreaking,

finally solving the problem
of how to transport people

up and through
this watery wilderness.

And while the Abt switch

has gone on to become
a fundamental part

of today's
cutting-edge funiculars,

this historic landmark
has stood the test of time.

Just imagine in 1879

when they, for the first time,

drove up that hill

in this spectacular,
comfortable transportation.

It's so unique.

Since railways began,

water has given them
a mighty challenge...

Inspiring solutions
that cross great divides...

This is an amazing
engineering feat.

To be able to be part of that
is very gratifying.

Raising engineering
to a higher level...

It's such a
beautiful piece of engineering,

so this is almost art.

To create extreme railroads.

This channel tunnel
is the first time

we've had a connection
between Europe and the U.K.

Since the ice age.

It is of worldwide importance.

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