Tunnel from spain to Morocco

[Mr porky]

Europe and Africa, united by the largest megaproject in history: Experts believe it is impossible

Europe and Africa brought together by the biggest megaproject in history: Experts think it's not conceivable. Can a tunnel be built under water?

www.eldiario24.com

I wonder if this will ever happen.

 

[Spriddler]

It would be safer option for migrants crossing the Med.

 

[Lenny HB]

Took over a hundred years from when they first started digging a channel tunnel so with Africans at one end could take a few hundred years.

 

[rosalan]

Just 13km but where would the money come from?
Like the Channel Tunnel, the crossing would be more expensive no doubt.

 

[PaulW2]

Europe and Africa, united by the largest megaproject in history: Experts believe it is impossible

Europe and Africa brought together by the biggest megaproject in history: Experts think it's not conceivable. Can a tunnel be built under water?

www.eldiario24.com

I wonder if this will ever happen.

I suspect not.

The sea is 900m deep there (English channel 175m).

And the tunnel would cross from the Eurasian to the African tectonic plates. The African plate subducts under the Eurasian plate, with the two land masses moving closer together at a cm a year. The Eurotunnel isn't similarly affected.

And the 'business case' seems quite a lot weaker than it was for the Eurotunnel. Morocco is a small economy and its hinterland - Algeria, Mauritania, Mali - is impoverished.

I think sometimes these ideas are proposed for reasons other than that the proposer seriously thinks they will be adopted (think of the 'proposed' bridge or tunnel to Northern Ireland) but because it's used as a signalling device (we're all one) or as a distraction from other problems.

Even in this case the headline tells us that the "experts think it's not conceivable". So who's doing the conceiving and why?