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Deep in the ground: Combat engineering is fighting the tunnels

IDF combat engineering is in charge of an important duty and massive responsibility in the current operation – destroying Hamas tunnels infrastructure.

The massive D9 vehicles are uncovering the ground layer and the unit’s soldiers are going on special missions inside the tunnels where the Hamas terrorists hide

Aug 02, 2014, 12:59PM | Rio Avitayler

via Israel News – Deep in the ground: Combat engineering is fighting the tunnels – JerusalemOnline.

 

IDF combat engineer exiting a tunnel

 

5 meters deep underground in Gaza, there is a horrid silence. While battle rages over the ground level, underground is utter silence. For most of us, the Hamas terror tunnels are a new threat, unknown and dangerous. But for the Yahalom elite combat engineering unit, it is exactly what they prepared for. They are working with the heavy engineering machinery unit to uncover those tunnels. In the last weeks they have been destroying tunnel after tunnel, and destroy the tunnels before they will be able to use them to enter Israel.

“When you visually see the tunnels you understand the amount of effort that has been put into them, there were bunkers, storage rooms of ammunition, and breathing systems to support long time underground. You see that someone professional made this”. Said Major Noam, one of the commanders in Yahalom.

The giant machine that IDF soldiers want in the front

On the way to the border with Gaza, next to Kibutz Be’eri, in the forward preparation ground we meet Rotem Levi, a heavy engineering machinery company commander. The work of uncovering the tunnels begins with his unit using the D9 caterpillar tractor. “It is a massive 40 ton vehicle that can easily take down any structure of any height, any force that wants to go in to Gaza, wants this vehicle on the front”, says Captain Levi.

From the D9 driver seat you can appreciate the vehicles capabilities and the protection it provides to its operator – fortified windows with old bullet holes, the space itself is quite small, no more than 2 square meters. Inside is a commander and a driver that sometime have to spend a whole day seeing the world through a dense protective net. That net is nicknamed “fifty-fifty”, either it stops the anti-tank missile, or it doesn’t.

 

The risk is part of the job. Yahalom soldiers. Channel 2

 

After the D9 finishes clearing the area, engineering ground forces arrive at the scene and begin treating the tunnels up close. Sometimes the tunnel or the shaft are booby-trapped so they work slowly while uncovering the tunnels. Once understanding the scale of the tunnel, the process of destroying them starts.

You can only guess where the tunnel ends

One of the tunnels was discovered 3 months ago, before the current operation. It stretches 2.5 kilometers, out of which 1.2 kilometers are inside Israeli territory. The problem that they run into even today, is that they know where the tunnel starts, but they never know where it ends, sometimes the last part it being dug right before the exit.

 

D9 tractor after being hit by an anti-tank missile

 

During the operation, 5 D9 operators were killed while uncovering tunnels. Yahalom lost one soldier and many were wounded. “Hamas blew up a tunnel while our forces were in there”, said Lt. Aharon, a team commander in Yahalom and adds, “it’s part of the job”.

In this operation, IDF uncovered 11 tunnels that go into Israel, and 20 more for other purposes. According to estimations, IDF destroyed 4 years’ worth of tunnel building.

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