Four months after opening, the Grouft tunnel along the A7 was unexpectedly closed in both directions on Wednesday evening due to a fire alarm triggered by a special convoy.
The special convoy had been travelling, accompanied by the Grand Ducal Police, in the direction of Friedhof-Neudorf when the combination of its low speed, flashing lights reflected on the tunnel walls and smoke triggered the emergency alert system just after 21:00 in the evening. This high threat alert meant that the tunnel systems were automatically closed and the emergency and motorway services were alerted.
CITA operators conducted an assessment of the situation in the tunnel and deemed the alert a false alarm. Soon after the police and motorway services intervened to manage the traffic caused by road users stopped outside of the tunnel.
Although the resetting of the fire alarm system should have theoretically been completed within an hour of the incident, this was not possible due to an alarm which could not be cleared, with IT specialists brought in to resolve the issue. At this point, the decision was taken to divert traffic towards the N7 and close the runnel towards Neudorf. A lane of traddic was reopened in the direction of Friedhof.
The technical issue was solve around midnight, with the tunnel put back into use shortly afterwards. The Administration of Roads and Bridges reported it had made a detailed analysis of the source and consequences of the fire alarm following the incident.
Photo by Felix Giorgetti
