underground

The gigantic Mayrit tunnel boring machine makes its way through the underground of Madrid to transform Metro L11

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It started on March 26 and in just over a month it has already left behind the first 200 meters of tunnel under the capital’s subsoil. The Mayrit tunnel boring machine advances towards Madrid Río with the objective of completing more than 5,200 meters of gallery before the end of 2027. And all to prepare the ground for the transformation of Metro L11. full throttle. The first month was slower than usual because the TBM was still in the adjustment phase. So has explained it the Department of Transport and Infrastructure of the Community of Madrid. And those first 200 meters have been drilled with the machine still running. However, from now on, Mayrit will reach its cruising speed: between 400 and 500 meters per month, which is equivalent to about 15 meters per day. What exactly is he doing underground. In addition to excavating (logically), as its cutting wheel, equipped with 54 discs, 172 picks and 24 battens, crushes the ground, the machine also places rings of concrete segments that form the final structure of the tunnel. At the same time, extracts about 3,500 tons of earth per day through conveyor belts that extend to the surface, where a hundred and a half trucks are responsible for transporting this material to landfills and disused mining operations. Transfer to the capital. Assembling a 98-meter-long, 1,500-ton machine at a depth of 27 meters is not a simple process. Mayrit was manufactured for 20 months in the German city of Schwana and traveled 2,000 kilometers by land and sea until reaching Madrid. Once here, it took 70 workers three months to assemble it piece by piece inside the future Comillas station. When does it stop and why? Mayrit works tirelessly 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in continuous shifts. But has scheduled stops. The first will be when it arrives at the future Madrid Río station, 1,114 meters from Comillas. There it will undergo a technical review of up to two weeks. Then he will repeat the process in Palos de la Frontera, Atocha and, finally, Conde de Casal. It can also stop at any intermediate point if any part needs replacement, which is scheduled approximately every 1,000 meters. The final destination and when it will arrive. The total route entrusted to Mayrit is 5,227 meters between Comillas and Conde de Casal, where the future interchange is located. The general director of Collective Transport Infrastructure of the Community of Madrid, Miguel Núñez, estimated In statements collected by 20 Minutes that the complete excavation will take between 13 and 14 months. With startup at the end of March, that puts the end of drilling around May or June 2027. Opening to the public will take a few more months, once installations, equipment and testing are completed. The work behind the tunnel boring machine. To complete this section 32,000 tons of steel will be needed210,000 cubic meters of concrete and more than 25,000 segments, whose production began in September 2025 in a factory created expressly for this project. The overall progress of the works already exceeds 50%, according to the City Council, and the investment in this phase amounts to more than 740 million euros. The biggest project behind it. All of this is just a part of something much bigger. The future Line 11 will travel 33.5 kilometers from end to end of Madrid, from Cuatro Vientos to Valdebebas, with 20 stations that will connect points such as Atocha, the airport, Zendal Hospital or the future Formula 1 circuit in Ifema. The complete route can be done in one hour and six minutes. The total investment exceeds 2.5 billion euros and the works will be carried out in four phases until 2031. Cover image | Community of Madrid In Xataka | From devouring diesel to being 100% electric: the incredible transformation of a 650-ton mining excavator in India

Madrid has the key mineral underground so that Europe does not depend on China. The problem is that there is a gap above

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Under the soil of Madrid lies a strategic resource that Europe desperately needs to reduce its technological dependence on China. To ensure this supply, the regional government has decided to make a move and protect the future of the Tolsadeco mine. The plan. As they progress in Europe Pressthe Community of Madrid finalizes the procedures to extend until 2037 the mining concession located between the districts of Vicálvaro and San Blas-Canillejas. It is about reactivating an open-air exploitation that has been paralyzed since 2007, with the aim of not losing access to the last reserves of a material critical for the industrial autonomy of the continent. A simple absorber or the future of the electric car? Although it is traditionally known for its domestic use as an absorbent material—especially in pet litter—sepiolite is today a very high-tech mineral. According to Europa Press citing the Elcano Royal InstituteSpain is the only European producer of this material, placing it as an extractive singularity of the country. In fact, the processing factory located in Vallecas transforms about 400,000 tons per year out of a global production estimated at 600,000. The strategic importance. High purity sepiolite is the basis of flame retardant additives essential for the cable, pipe, automotive and construction industries. These components allow Europe to replace antimony oxide, a raw material that is today imported almost exclusively from China. Furthermore, the mineral is the core of the project MADBATa Madrid initiative to develop high-performance electrodes for electric vehicle batteries. The economic impact projected by the concessionaire company, Tolsa, is ambitious: a turnover of 113 million euros, with more than 53 million destined for international export. The emptying of the water and the promise for 2037. To resume extraction, the first step will be to evacuate the water accumulated during two decades of inactivity. The Ministry of Economy defends this intervention under an argument that transcends the industry: citizen safety. The regional administration emphasizes that it is not a natural lagoon, but rather a deep mining hole with clay soils that, as they warn in their reports, act like “quicksand.” Despite the fences and signage, the place has become a recurring clandestine bathing point. Tragedy has struck this enclave on several occasions: since 2012, three people have lost their lives due to drowning in these waters, including the death of a minor in June 2021, according to the files of Europa Press. Given this danger, the Community of Madrid promises that, upon completion of exploitation in 2037, the area will be restored through a “safe and planned reconfiguration” that will create new controlled lagoons. The clash with the neighbors: the destruction of an ecosystem. However, the reactivation plan clashes head-on with neighborhood and environmental opposition. The Regional Federation of Neighborhood Associations of Madrid (FRAVM) and various groups have denounced, in statements spread by Europa Pressthat the work will mean the “destruction of the Laguna Grande.” The associations deny the official version about the origin of the water, ensuring that it has a phreatic character and is connected to a deep aquifer. In addition, they warn about the impact on biodiversity—especially in breeding colonies of the sapper planea protected bird—and about the proximity of mining activity to homes, sports facilities and educational centers. For organizations like Ecologistas en Acción and SEO/BirdLife, This extension is a bucket of cold water: postpone sine die the long-awaited project of converting the Ambroz environment into a large “Eastern Country House”, integrated into the Metropolitan Forest. The groups have not been slow to react: they are already preparing allegations and keeping open the possibility of taking legal action. The price of European autonomy. The Ambroz lagoons conflict perfectly illustrates one of the great industrial and environmental crossroads of the present. On the one hand, the undeniable geopolitical need for Europe to secure strategic materials to lead the energy transition and stop the Asian monopoly. On the other hand, the high ecological cost that this strategy requires at the local level. Madrid has decided to shield its sepiolite mine in favor of the technology industry, but the price to pay will be to empty – at least for the next decade – the oasis that nature had silently claimed in the southeast of the capital. Image | freepik Xataka | From devouring diesel to being 100% electric: the incredible transformation of a 650-ton mining excavator in India

In the middle of the war, Israel’s underground parking lots have begun to fill with something: tents

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On the fourth floor of the underground parking lot of the Dizengoff Centerone of the most popular shopping centers in Tel Aviv, the difficult thing these days is seeing cars. There are also not many motorcycles, vans or any other type of vehicle. What has occupied the squares painted on the ground for weeks are dozens of tents, the ‘home’ improvised by Israelis looking for a place to protect themselves from the attacks with which Iran has responded to ‘Operation Epic Fury’ that on February 28 ended the life of its leader, Ali Khamenei. While on the surface the sirens sound warning of the arrival of missiles, there, on the -4 floor, life goes on among removable tents. “Look where I am”. With that phrase I started a few days ago tiktoker Andrea Bisso (@Latinaenisrael96) a video in which it shows the parking lot of a shopping center in Israel. The curious thing is that as you walk through its corridors you don’t see cars or people with shopping carts, but rather tents, an improvised table on pallets where food is distributed, handwritten posters hanging from the columns, clothes hanging from cables… The landscape that marks the daily life of the dozens of families who take refuge there. “People are living here now, in times of war. This is where they have moved. It’s incredible how people started to live in a parking lot. These are people who have small children, can’t run to a shelter, don’t have one nearby or are elderly who can’t go down the stairs… They prefer to live here,” relates Andrea as she walks through the parking lot. “Alternate reality”. The tiktoker is not the only one that has shown how the war has transformed some unexpected places in Israel. A few days ago Zeb Stub also did it on an extensive report for The Times of Israel in which it affects the same idea. In fact, he talks about the “alternative reality” that has been created on the -4th floor of the Dizengoff Center parking lot, where “a city” basically made up of dozens of tents has been deployed. Curiously, life activates beneath the surface while it decays in commercial areas. Stub explains for example that in the Azrieli Centeralso in Tel Aviv, some businesses estimate that activity has fallen by 20% or even 50% in recent weeks. “Many people come simply to get out of the house,” they say from a shoe store. “The normal thing before Passover is that people come to buy new clothes, but this year they are not thinking about that.” Life goes on underground. Gal, a teacher who teaches remotely, explained to the Israeli newspaper that she decided to move to the Dixengoff shelter last week among other reasons because she had to constantly interrupt her work in her apartment. “I teach online classes and having to stop every time the siren sounds is making my work more complicated,” recognize the woman In the shelter you don’t just see people eating, sleeping, working or simply hanging out. a chronicle from the Associated Press (AP) talks about much more casual scenes, such as a bride posing with her family for a wedding photo session or young people dressed up for celebrate the holiday Purim Jewish… There are also spaces for attend to medical emergencieslike the improvised one in a parking lot under the Sheba Medical Center, in Ramant Gan. Are there no conventional shelters? Yes. Israel has public shelters. It is also not unusual to find private spaces designed precisely so that people can take shelter during emergencies. When the alarms sound, people barricade themselves in them, usually for fifteen minutes, half an hour… however long the alert lasts from when the sirens sound. However, there are those who, for one reason or another, choose to put their belongings in a suitcase and temporarily settle in spaces where they feel safer than in their homes, such as parking lots. The Dizengoff Center is an example, but there is more. Under the Tel Aviv bus station there are dozens of families, especially immigrants, who have settled in tents. Crossover attacks. Noah Efron, from the Tel Aviv-Jaffa municipal council, claimed these days that the underground shelters in Tel Aviv are designed to house families at times like the current one, when the Middle East is convulsed by the offensive launched by Israel itself and the US on Iran. Over the last few weeks, cities like Tel Aviv have received attacks of the Islamist regime, damaging buildings and causing injuries and even fatalities. Israel is not the only one living under the threat of missiles. His army has also been hitting Iran and Lebanon for weeks. In fact, in cities like Tehran or Kfar Rumman there are a significant balance of wounded and dead. Images | TikTok and Wikipedia In Xataka | Iran has just crossed the great energy red line: Türkiye is the first victim of a blackout that is already looking to Europe

The southern entrance to the A5 underground is already 80% excavated, and there is a culprit that has speeded up the work: the soil

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Allow me, if you don’t mind, to use an expression that I have been wanting to use for a long time: there is already light in the tunnel. That’s right, then the burial of the A5 Move against the clock to meet deadlines. And the goal is to open traffic in November. The southern tunnel of the Extremadura highway has already exceeded four fifths of its route under Madrid. There is less left, largely due to the technical innovations that have made it possible. The largest work in Madrid right now. The burial of the A-5 is, today, the largest infrastructure under construction of the capital. Under the streets that connect Madrid with the exit to Extremadura, two tunnel boring machines work in parallel to bury one of the historic entrances to the city and thus free up surface space for urban use. Where is each tunnel. The work runs in two independent galleries. The southern tunnel, through which vehicles entering Madrid will circulate, has been excavated for approximately 80% of its length. The northern tunnel, the exit, is advancing at a slower pace and has completed about half of the route. Although the asphalt has not yet been laid, the interior appearance of the most advanced gallery already allows a fairly clear idea of ​​what the final infrastructure will look like, according to transfer to Telemadrid the technical teams that supervise the work. The key to acceleration: the ground. As the media points out, a new construction system applied to the tunnel floor has made it possible to speed up both the excavation and the consolidation of the infrastructure. For this reason, and because of the work that is being put into the work every day, it has been possible to reach 80% without major delays, maintaining the schedule. 14 emergency exits. Parallel to the main gallery, the work includes the construction of 14 emergency exits, one every approximately 200 meters. Each of them is accompanied by technical rooms where the systems necessary for the operation of the tunnel will be housed, including geothermal installations that will improve its energy efficiency. Jump to the surface. Starting in September is planned that the works also extend abroad, with urbanization actions in the area around the A-5. The idea in this phase will be to definitively integrate the infrastructure into the surface, with the aim of reducing traffic outside and taking advantage of the area for new public spaces. November, the date marked on the calendar. With the tunnel boring machines still in operation, the goal is for vehicles to be able to travel through the new tunnel before the end of the year. November is the date currently managed by those responsible for the work. So we just have to wait a few more months to call it a day. one of the heaviest works of these years in the capital. Cover image | Madrid City Council In Xataka | Portugal had to choose where to take its AVE first. And between Madrid and Galicia, it is very clear

The US recorded something strange underground and didn’t know what it was. Now he has just accused China of pressing the nuclear button

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During the Cold War, even at times of greatest nuclear tension, Washington and Moscow maintained an unwritten rule: If a test was done, the world had to find out. The explosions were political signals as much as military experiments, designed to be seen, measured and, of course, feared. Therefore, talking about detonations so small that they barely leave a seismic trace and about tests designed not to be detected, generates great concern. The United States just accused China exactly that. An unprecedented accusation. It happened last Friday, when the United States denounced China for having carried out at least a nuclear test with explosive performance in 2020 and to prepare for other low-power ones, a complaint made in Geneva through by Undersecretary Thomas DiNanno just as the classical arms control framework is collapsing after the New START expiration. According to Washington, Beijing would have resorted to decoupling techniques to dampen seismic signals and hide underground detonations, an accusation of enormous political significance because it breaks the previous ambiguity and indicates for the first time a specific date, the June 22, 2020in the midst of debate over whether the United States should recover the option of testing nuclear weapons again. The diffuse limit. The technical and legal background is key to understanding the controversy, since both China and the United States have signed, but not ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treatyallowing subcritical testing no self-sustaining nuclear reaction but prohibits any explosion with measurable output. Washington maintains that Beijing would have crossed that line with evidence very low powerdifficult to detect, while the body in charge of verification, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization, ensures that its network did not detect no event compatible with a nuclear explosion that day, thus underlining the fragility of a control system that never came into full force. Lop Nur, satellites and silent expansion. It we have counted other times. American suspicions are also supported by satellite images and intelligence analysis that point to intense activity in the historic Lop Nur polygonwith new excavations, tunnels and drilling that could be used for both subcritical tests and higher performance detonations. This movement fits with the rapid expansion of the Chinese arsenal, which would already exceed the 600 nuclear warheads and could reach a thousand before 2030reinforcing the perception in Washington that the real strategic challenge is no longer Moscow but a Beijing with the capacity and will to challenge US military primacy. A new nuclear race scenario. The Washington complaint comes accompanied by a clear political message: without binding limits, transparency or verification mechanisms that include China, the system inherited from the Cold War ceases to serve, and the United States reserves the right to adopt “parallel steps”including the resumption of testing, if it considers that other actors are breaking the rules. Beijing strongly rejects accusations, claims its moratorium and its doctrine of no first use, but the simple verbal clash shows a change of phase, one with the risk that the end of New START and mutual distrust open the door to a new nuclear race in which small, almost invisible explosions can have enormous strategic consequences. Image | CCTV In Xataka | Nuclear fusion is humanity’s great utopia in the short term: China has already set a date for it In Xataka | China is building something that looks like an oil well. It is actually a nuclear bunker with a command center

Cars will drive underground in 2026

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Madrid is about to complete one of its most ambitious works, which has been disrupting traffic and surrounding homes for some time. The burial of the A-5 This Monday it reached a key milestone by connecting two sections of the tunnel that were being excavated independently. The good news for drivers: before the end of 2026 They will be able to circulate through the tunnel. And for the residents of the southwest of Madrid, the City Council will put out to tender this month the works that will convert the surface into the promised great green promenade. What has happened? This Monday an excavator broke the earth wall that separated two underground galleries under Villamanín Street, thus joining two sections into a continuous 1.3 kilometer tunnel. The cale, which is what the operation that has been carried out to achieve this is called, will be repeated until completing the total 3.8 kilometers of the burial. So far, 2.1 kilometers have been excavated along the entire route, as confirmed by the City Council. The deadlines are maintained. The mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, guaranteed that “before the end of the year it will be possible to circulate” through the tunnel, thus fulfilling the initial forecasts despite the meteorological difficulties. According to Almeida, this January “it rained twice as much as in January 2025”, which has complicated the work. The schedule seems to be going intact, with 600 workers and 400 machines working daily in the area. It should also be noted that the project has progressed mainly underground, which has protected the work from the rains. What happens to the surface. This February the contract to develop the Paseo Verde del Suroeste will go out to tender, with an approximate budget of 75 million euros. The mayor advertisement that the surface works will start in November, when traffic already circulates through the tunnel, with the intention of creating 80,000 square meters of green areas. The goal is for residents to be able to walk through at least one of their gardens in spring 2027. Union. The works aim to eliminate a physical barrier that has fragmented neighborhoods such as Lucero, Campamento, Batán and Aluche. In this way, the objective is that the tens of thousands of cars that circulate daily on the A-5 can do so underground, while residents can cross from one side to the other without the need for underpasses. The Madrid City Council considers this work “the most emblematic that is being done in the city since the burying of the M-30”, according to counted Almeida. The next step. The priority of the work now is to complete the excavation of the tunnels, scheduled for April, followed by the installation of ventilation systems, emergency exits, cameras and extractors. The Consistory has guaranteed that no further traffic detours will be necessary until the end of the works. In fact, some of the current ones are going to be eliminated, such as the curved detour of the Amusement Park that was already eliminated on January 14, and those of Yébenes, Boadilla and Batán, which will be eliminated in the summer. Technique. Just like share Since 20 Minutes, the project uses the ‘cut and cover’ method, which allows it to work in parallel both underground and on the surface. First the retaining walls were built using piles, then the slabs that cover the tunnel were installed (already 83.5% completed), now excavation is underway under these slabs and, finally, the surface will be urbanized while the tunnel is given its final finishing touch. And now what. The City Council is already working on drafting a second phase that contemplate bury another additional 700 meters to extend the tunnel to Cuatro Vientos. This expansion should go “in parallel with Operation Camp,” according to the mayor, although it is still in the preliminary project phase. In Xataka | Madrid wants to put 110,000 tons of weight on the M-30. And the challenge is not technical: it is not to collapse the road

In this city in Ukraine, going outside is not an option because of the drones. So they have found a solution: live underground

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For decades war was thought of as a recognizable front line, with more or less secure soldiers, trenches and rearguards. The massive emergence of drones has dynamited that scheme: the sky has become a permanent hunting ground, the distinction between combatant and civilian has been blurred and entire cities now live under the constant threat of cheap and lethal machines that can attack at any moment. In Ukraine they have forced everyday life to hide underground to continue existing. Kherson and the threat behind the windows. The key Ukrainian city has become the most extreme example of how drones have transformed war and civil lifeto the point that going outside has become the closest thing to a “death sport”, with Russian quadcopters operating from the other bank of the Dnieper that they hunt random people in what the Ukrainians themselves describe as a “human safari.” In a city of wide avenues and tsarist architecture, today the sky is the true enemy, responsible for hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries in a single year, in what the United Nations and human rights organizations describe as war crimes and the world’s most intensive use of drones against a civilian population. Live underground. Faced with the impossibility of completely protecting the surface, life in Kherson has declined literally underground. There is no rhetoric, since they literally live underground with hospitals, maternity wards, public offices, theaters and cultural spaces moved to basements and former Soviet shelters, while playgrounds have been replaced. through underground game rooms and all schools in the city operate only online. This forced displacement has created a strange and oppressive routine in which day-to-day life passes between corridors, bunkers and improvised roomsbecause any exposure to the open sky can end in seconds with a guided explosion from a remote camera. It is the real version of any scenario that science fiction cinema or literature ever staged. Improvised defenses. Faced with this omnipresent threat, the authorities have deployed a combination of solutions that illustrate the extent to which the city lives in an almost post-apocalyptic future, with kilometers of anti-drone networks covering entire streets, mesh tunnels over the main access roads, electronic interference walls next to the river and hundreds of concrete capsules spread along the sidewalks to offer immediate shelter. Even so, those responsible themselves admit that nothing is completely effectivebecause drones evolve, dodge defenses, throw grenades or mines and turn any daily journey into a desperate race in which you cannot run faster than the machine you are chasing from the air. Live, not just survive. In this extreme context, the effort is not limited to keeping the population alive, but rather to preserving a minimum feeling of normalityespecially for the little ones, children, who grow up under constant stress and fear of going outside. In fact, there is a whole network of psychologists, educators and volunteers who organize dance, art or biology classes in basements, install sandboxes so that the little ones can touch the ground and even create spaces where choosing, playing and learning is a form of emotional resistance in the face of a war that invades everything. The idea is clear in Kherson: it is not enough to hide, you have to keep livingeven under layers of cement. The laboratory of a disturbing future. If you like, Kherson is not just a devastated city, but an advance which many fear will become the norm in many other conflicts of the future, one where cheap and precise drones democratize the ability to attack civilians with an ease that was unthinkable just a few years ago. Thus, after a Russian occupation, a liberation celebrated and an immediate return of horror from a distance, the city has been trapped a kilometer from the front, with a population reduced to a fraction of the original that, despite everything, refuses to leave. Underground, between networks, shelters and constant alarms, Kherson survives like a brutal warning of how the war of the future can empty the streets and push human life to simply hide to exist. Image | Ministry of Defense of Ukraine In Xataka | A drone takes aim and blows up a Russian penguin in front. It is the result of an increasingly absurd war In Xataka | Three Russians surrender on camera: what was previously a “normal” scene in the war in Ukraine is science fiction

the underground works of the A-5 in Madrid

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Yesterday, January 19, 2026, a little before 8 in the morning, I was already in front of the computer preparing for the work day. I had been carrying out a task for a few minutes when suddenly, surprise: the websites I was trying to load in the browser did not load. The Wi-Fi connection had been cut offso I tried the network connection. Nothing. My wife, who was also online at the time, confirmed it to me. We didn’t have internet at home. Taking a look at the HGU router we use (we are O2 customers) I found two red lights flashing. I turned it off and on again, but the problem persisted. This looks bad, I thought. I immediately called O2 customer service, at 1551, and found the second surprise: they don’t answer until nine in the morning unless the phone is lost or stolen. Fortunately, the mobile data connection was still working, so I went to it: I shared that connection from my mobile to my work computer through tethering and I got to work without too many problems: the bandwidth of 5G connections is already more than enough for this type of scenario, so essentially I didn’t notice the problem too much. Shortly after nine in the morning I called O2 again, and a person answered the call to whom I told the problem. As soon as I did it, he told me that there was a service interruption in my area —”Oh, is it in my area, isn’t it something just mine?” I asked—and that they were working on solving it. “In the meantime,” he said, “We are going to offer you an unlimited data bonus both to your line and to all those associated with your contract. The person who assisted me also told me that the company would notify me by message when the incident was resolved. Some time later I received that confirmation message, and I continued working with the mobile data thinking that the problem would be resolved in a few hours. It’s been more than 24 hours and I’m still the same. The works on the A-5, recurring culprits Throughout yesterday I checked from time to time to see if the lights on the router changed, and just in case I restarted it to regain normal connectivity as soon as possible. There was no way. Source: Diario de Madrid. When several hours had passed and we still had no solution to the problem, I looked for some more information about the cause and quickly found an article in ADSLZone commenting on it: the underground works of the A-5who had left without internet an unknown number of Movistar and O2 clients. Those affected belong to the southwest area of ​​Madrid —Aluche, Campamento, Colonia Jardín, Pozuelo—, and I was one of them. This latest incident is not the first of its kind, and in fact there have already been cuts, for example in july, in August and in November. In all of them the reason was the underground works on the A-5, although at no time has the specific reason why these cuts occurred been clarified. This work is producing other side effects such as the saturation of Metro line 10, the dust and the deteriorated air quality for the residents of the surrounding areas, or traffic jams on the roads enabled in an extraordinary way throughout the underground. However, it is evident that the project is moving forward, and a few days ago the two sections of tunnel were connected executed to date. The tunnel is expected to be completed in Aprilalthough the vehicles They will not be able to circulate through it until the end of the year. Let’s hope that from now on there will be no more outages and the rest of the problems will also be mitigated. In Xataka | There is an extensive system to avoid being cut off in the 48 km underground of the M-30. It’s time to renew it

It’s not underground, it’s in the recycling of your old windows

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Galicia has strived to demonstrate that the future of the industry is not found underground, extracting finite resources, but in the ability to rescue what we have already used. In a global context obsessed with decarbonization, the town of Coirós, in A Coruña, has hit the table to position itself as an “eternal” aluminum power. The great industrial milestone. According to the company itselfCortizo has invested 38 million euros in a new recycling plant designed to absorb aluminum waste and return it to the market as new material. It is not a typical storage warehouse; It is an area of ​​29,000 square meters where teams of operators, protected with aluminized suits to withstand radiant heat, supervise state-of-the-art smelting furnaces and crushing systems. After a period of testing this summer, the plant has officially started its activity and is now ready to reach its full operational capacity. It is the Galician response to the challenge of the scarcity of raw materials: stop depending on mining to trust in the efficiency of recycling. A vision with history. But to understand this movement it is necessary to look back. The general director of the firm, Raquel Cortizo, insists that this commitment to circularity is not a passing fad. According to the specialized media Retemathe company was already a pioneer in the 90s by launching its foundry in Padrón. At that time, when the concept of “circular economy” was barely mentioned, Cortizo already became the first company in Spain to close the complete production cycle. However, the current leap is on a different scale. The new facilities have the capacity to produce 100,000 tons of recycled aluminum billet per year. The environmental impact La Voz de Galicia summarizes it: This production volume will avoid emitting more than one and a half million tons of CO2 per year. To put it in perspective, the company estimates that it is equivalent to stop emitting the gases generated for a year by all tourism in the provinces of A Coruña and Pontevedra together. The choreography of recycling. The plant works with what is technically known as “post-consumer scrap”: from old windows and facades to bicycle wheels or tent structures that have ended their useful life. The process is divided into two critical phases: Precision classification: Each element is mechanically crushed and separated until pure aluminum is obtained. Smelting and rebirth: The metal is melted to become the billet Infinity. This product comes in cylinders seven meters long. The most astonishing thing is its environmental footprint: its manufacturing consumes 95% less energy than obtaining primary aluminum. It is, in essence, a material that saves energy while being manufactured. Strengthening the Galician muscle The Coirós plant is the spearhead of a larger strategy. The company has invested 228 million euros in the community in the last five years alone. Projects like the Technological Campus wave expansion of its factories in Padrón They are now consolidated with this new center. The relevance of this “Galician aluminum” is already noticeable in homes throughout the country. The company points out, in one of his press releasesthe alliance with the developer Metrovacesa, which already installs these 100% recycled solutions in 14 housing developments in cities such as Madrid, Barcelona or Seville. It is the perfect cycle: the aluminum that is recovered from a renovation or scrapping returns to Coirós to end up supporting the windows of the new homes in the country. Towards an infinite industry? Galicia has found in aluminum a way to lead the ecological transition without giving up its manufacturing identity. The Coirós plant is proof that the industry can be clean, efficient and, above all, infinite. The message that comes out of these facilities is clear: in a throwaway world, Galicia has decided that nothing is lost and everything is transformed. Image | Cortizo Xataka | Europe is looking for where to put its first nuclear fusion reactor. And Spain is one of the best candidates

Germany has spent three nights copying Taiwan. If Russia decides to invade it, it has had an idea: surprise them underground

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Last July, the Taiwan subway experienced an unusual day: Instead of passengers loaded with purses and suitcases, soldiers, soldiers and more soldiers armed with anti-tank missiles began to arrive at Taipei stations. The reason was twofold: to send a message inside and outside (China) of the country. That idea seduced Germany, and now that it has begun its rearmament it has launched in Berlin. A disturbing return. The exercise Bollwerk Bärlin III Last week, he returned to the German capital a scene that seemed banished to the memories of the 20th century: soldiers descending U-Bahn stairsjumping onto the tracks and advancing through smoke, simulated gunshots and cars taken over by “saboteurs.” For three nights, between 1 and 4 in the morning, about 250 members of the Wachbataillon (a unit known for its ceremonial role but with infantry functions) transformed stations like Jungfernheide into a real underground battlefield to practice assaults, close combat, evacuation of civilians and protection of critical infrastructure in a realistic environment in which nothing is altered or mocked up: the narrowness of the tunnels, limited visibility and changes in light are the same as they would find in a real war scenario. In the background: Russia. They remembered the TWZ analysts that this return to urban warfare in tunnels and stations, without embellishments or theatrical simulations, symbolizes a profound change in Germany’s strategic priorities and revealed the extent to which the shadow of a possible conflict with Russia has penetrated into the very heart of Germany. his military planning. The metamorphosis. The battalion in charge of displaying honors on state visits had been conceived for decades as a symbol of institutional stability, not as a combat force. However, its real operational mission (protecting the federal government and its facilities in the event of a crisis) today takes on an urgency that has not been seen for a long time. Hence the direct tone of his commanderlieutenant colonel Maik Teichgräber: Berlin is your area of ​​operations and they must prepare for “the worst case scenario,” which means training where you would really fight. The use of stations closed to the public allows practice quick entriesassaults on trains, neutralization of enemies and immediate removal of wounded, integrating snipers, perimeter security and coordination between units in a densely urbanized environment. The presence of additional scenarios (such as the former Rüdersdorf chemical plant or the Ruhleben police complex) underlines the desire to turn the capital’s defense into a multidimensional exercisecapable of absorbing everything from internal sabotage to coordinated incursions that seek to paralyze the political center of Germany. Global dimension of the trend. Which happens in Berlin It is also reflected in other regions of the world. How we countTaiwan uses its subway as a defensive artery during the Han Kuang exercises, aware that, in the event of a Chinese invasion, underground infrastructure they would be vital to move troops and supplies while the surface becomes a continuous target. In parallel, the United States has raised the underground war a priority for its special forces, responding to the proliferation of fortified tunnels, dense urban areas and the expansion of drone swarms that force troops to seek refuge underground. The growing autonomy of unmanned systems, already present in Ukraine, accelerates this trend: in a future where aerial surveillance will be almost constant, defending in depth will mean dominating not only streets and buildings, but subways, tunnels, pipelines and interconnected bunkers. The war of the future, according to these emerging doctrines, will be fought both upwards (against drones, sensors and loitering munitions) and downwards, in an underground network that takes on strategic value. Echoes of the Cold War. He training on the U-Bahn inevitably refers to a divided Berlinwhen the city was a western enclave surrounded by Warsaw Pact forces. At that time, the United States, the United Kingdom and France were rehearsing urban operations aimed at slowing down an invasion to gain political time, aware that holding the city indefinitely was unrealistic. Units like the (secret) Detachment A They practiced sabotage and unconventional warfare techniques from the shadows. Even stations, such as Pankstraße or Siemensdamm, were designed like nuclear shelters for more than 3,000 people for weeks, with armored doors and air filtering. The reunified Germany had left behind that architecture of fear, and today, faced with a panorama of uncertainty, it returns to study how to reactivate these civil protection capabilities. The contrast is evident: what in 1994 seemed unnecessary is once again considered a strategic necessity. Historical rearmament. we have been counting. The exercise is also part of a context transformation unprecedented german military apparatus. By 2029, Berlin plans spend 153,000 million euros per year in defense (around 3.5% of GDP), an enormous jump from the levels that for decades were a source of friction with Washington. It is a rearmament designed not only for modernize capabilitiesbut to adapt the country to threats that They are no longer theoretical: What happens 900 kilometers away, in Ukraine, conditions the entire strategy. This budget increase has led NATO to consider a symbolic turn that would have been unthinkable during the Cold War: that Germany would command the allied forces in Europe. Although that moment has not arrivedthe expectation underscores the pressure on Berlin to demonstrate that it can take on top responsibilities and is willing to prepare its military for complex scenariosfrom urban sabotage to large-scale conventional warfare. Strategic warning. Teichgräber put it clearly: Nobody can guarantee that the war that is currently devastating Ukraine will not one day reach German territory. That phrase sums up the background of Bollwerk Bärlin III. The Bundeswehr trains in the subway tunnels because it understands that contemporary conflicts do not respect borders or capitals. The hybrid warcoordinated attacks on critical infrastructure and the massive use of drones They make the interior of cities as vulnerable as their borders. If you like, what is at stake is not only the defense of Berlin, but Germany’s capacity to react facing a moment in which the strategic … Read more

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