Thanks to the joint efforts of almost half a century by several research institutes in the past, the key technological problems in railway engineering on the frozen earth of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau have by and large been solved. The railway will turn out the longest on the frozen earth highland of the world.

The frozen earth is a hard nut to crack in the engineering of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. Of the total 1,118-km-long railway, the section that lies over 4000 meters above sea level extends some 965 kilometers with 550-km in the frozen earth zone. It is so far the longest railway in the world traversing through an alpine and rigid zone that is short of oxygen and with continuous and permanent frozen earth. Ever since 1950s, the Prospecting and Designing Institute of the Ministry of Railways together with the Frozen Earth Research Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences and the northwest branch of the Research Institute of Railway Engineering have for quite a long time engaged in the research and practice of railway construction in the frozen earth area. Up to now, they have solved the fundamental issues in the project, thereby laying a solid foundation for the ultimate construction of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway.

Date:Wednesday, January 10, 2001

Peopledaily