The tunnel alignment crosses fine sand and fine-medium sand with gravel in the Uznam and Wolin sides.

Below the Swina strait are deposits of fine-medium sand with gravel.

Zhang Boyang, chairman of the Jiangsu province-based company, said the 1,469-meter tunnel is being built through a mixture of cohesive soil, gravel, sandy soil and fine gravel that has a high underground water level and abundant surface water.

The project to upgrade roads into all-weather gravel will be implemented in Northern, Northwestern, Central and Copperbelt provinces, he added.

- A new gigantic Chinese-made shield machine has been munching mud and gravel under the ground of Moscow since Tuesday, propelling China-Russia cooperation in infrastructure construction.

Spanning 200 meters, construction workers of China Railway 24th Bureau Group Corp reinforced the subgrade foundation using cement fly-ash gravel (CFG) piles.

Zhang Boyang, chairman of the Jiangsu province-based company, said the tunnel was bored through a mixture of cohesive soil, loose gravel, sandy soil and fine gravel that has a high underground water-content level and abundant surface water.

The area has annual sunshine of more than 2,600 hours, yearly rainfall of 525 millimeters, a mean annual temperature of 13 C and soil with high gravel content.

"Currently, we have better living conditions because we have reliable electricity, national and gravel roads, health centers and schools," she told Xinhua News Agency, referring to the infrastructure development projects that the Lower Sesan II hydropower company had built for the resettled villagers.