I've worked on Brightwater. The problem with Brightwater is there were two contractors, for each tunnel. The first contractor was allowed to choose the appropriate TBM for the conditions. The other contractor was not, for some reason. Guess which one got stuck?

As for a true, bored tunnel? It's the safest place to be during an earthquake.(I'm an engineering geologist who did my graduate thesis in earthquake seismology and tectonics).

Looking forward to the replacement! Yay for JOBS and FIXING INFRASTRUCTURE!!!

I mainly grew up in St. Louis, but spent time all over the Plains and that part of the South, and this is bizarre, even for tornado alley standards.

I really hope this isn't foretelling an awful hurricane season, as well.

I'm actually a geologist (an environmental one, at that) who has a LOT of experience with drilling. And I'm not going to vilify these guys.

The bottom line is that even when the engineers completely overengineer a solution to a problem, the earth is a heterogeneous medium. This means every now and then, something's going to happen that you just do not expect. I can count so many times when something has gone wrong on a job that I thought was completely simple, because there was no way to know what was below that drill bit.

Also, in my dealings with petro companies, they tend to be the most ridiculously obsessive when it comes to safety because they know they're deep pockets. It's not like they wanted to cause some massive oil spill.