At a very special location in the Swiss Alps, Brownline surveyed a drill job of 317 meters on behalf of our customer Zmoos SA in the summer of 2021. This unusual drill job took place at a spectacular location: 80 meters under a mountaintop, at an altitude of 2000 meters.
The town of Bagnes is located in the middle of the Swiss Alps and is surrounded by high mountain peaks. In addition to mountains, this area also contains many reservoirs, where hydroelectric power stations generate electricity. One of the largest in the area is the Lac de Mauvoisin reservoir. This reservoir is closed off by a 250-meter high dam and powers two hydroelectric power stations. The drill surveyed by us was for the construction of a water pipe for another hydropower turbine near Bagnes.
With that, all of the regular goes out the window, because the job site was not just located at an altitude of about 2000 meters and the only way to get there was via narrow, unpaved roads. Normally, the Brownline surveyor drives the van containing all the necessary materials straight to the drilling site. Since our vans and all of the customer's materials are quite large and could therefore not come up the narrow roads, everything had to be handled differently. A helicopter was called in for all materials that could not be transported by road, which brought everything onto the mountain in a spectacular way. In addition, this 317-meter long bore had to be carried out with a relatively compact drill rig. A bigger machine simply wouldn't have gotten up the mountain, nor would it have fit on the job site. The plotted trajectory was also different from normal. It went up in a straight line with a gradient of 6%, right through the mountain.
The hard rocky bottom made for a tough drilling, but also once more proved the power of the Drillguide Gyro Steering Tool: The drill surfaced at mere centimeters from the exit point stake. Extreme accuracy was achieved in these challenging conditions, without any influence from external interference!
The water mains can be put into use quickly, so that the water’s natural power can be used to generate electricity.
Below you can see our flying Drillguide Gyro Steering Tool!