Video: A Rare Look Inside the First Tunnel Under the Thames Built by Brunel

Over the bank holiday weekend, hundreds of people were being given the rare chance to take the trip through the Thames Tunnel as it is open for rare walking tours while trains are suspended for engineering work.

The Thames Tunnel is an underwater tunnel, built beneath the River Thames in London, connecting Rotherhithe and Wapping. It measures 35 feet (11 m) wide by 20 feet (6 m) high and is 1,300 feet (396 m) long, running at a depth of 75 feet (23 m) below the river surface measured at high tide. It was the first tunnel known to have been constructed successfully underneath a navigable river, and was built between 1825 and 1843 using Thomas Cochrane and Marc Isambard Brunel’s newly invented tunnelling shield technology, by him and his son Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

The tunnel was originally designed for, but never used by, horse-drawn carriages. It now forms part of the London Overground railway network.

I hope they offer the chance to go through the tunnel on foot again – I’d love to see it!