Metrostav on Iceland

The biggest Czech construction company, Metrostav, has been active on Iceland already for 14 years. There were four tunnels of the overall length of 23 km built in the land of ice and fire this year.

At the end of October, they finished and opened the Dýrafjörður tunnel in the barren lands of Iceland. The Metrostav company has also been cooperating for a long time with the Sandvik company which have been using their technology in the North a lot.

The southern entrance of the tunnel is, according to the project manager of Dýrafjörður, Josef Malknecht, probably the most bizzare place he has ever worked at.  The surrounding area of Dýrafjörður is one of the windiest places in Iceland which has been almost un-accessible until the opening of the tunnel. The technicians were completely separated from the world for five weeks during winter.

“We have seen blizzards that did not allow us to leave the base. I am glad that the project is ready and finished and nobody got hurt,” said Malknecht who has been working at the site since 2017. Even though the conditions were not ideal, we have managed to make several records in the speed of tunnelling – we have tunnelled 111 metres in a week and 405 metres in a month,” said Aleš Gothard, Chief Executive Director of Metrostav Norge company to the 

The two lane Dýrafjörður tunnel is 5.3 kilometres long and crosses the Icelandic Hrafnseyrarheiði plateau. It is very important for the locals because it connects two fjords and shortens the way by more than thirty kilometres.

Source: Lomy a těžba