In the midsummer, the wind and sand whizzed past, the desert sand and sea were full of greenery, standing on the railway and looking into the distance, a desert railway loop across the Taklimakan Desert runs through it. The name of this desert railway loop is Heruo Railway.

The Taklimakan Desert, the second largest mobile desert in the world, is known as the Sea of Death. It has been ravaged by wind and sand all year round, with a dry climate, little rainfall, and a large temperature difference between day and night. It can only rely on highways with long transportation distance, high cost, long time and small transportation capacity. Various factors restrict the economic development of counties, cities and group farms along the route. For the people along the route, there is no railway and more than 1,000 detours are required to go out of Xinjiang. kilometer. In order to drive the economic development along the line and improve people's livelihood, the builders of the Heruo Railway have used their actions to turn the Sea of Death into a place of hope.

On the morning of September 27, 2021, the whole line of the Heruo Railway in Minfeng County, Hotan Prefecture, Xinjiang was laid and connected, marking the official closure of the Taklimakan Desert Railway Line. On April 30, 2022, at the construction site of the Heruo Railway in Yuquan Town, Hotan Prefecture, with the completion of the paving of the drop-off platform at Yuquan Town Station, the new 9 passenger terminal rooms on the Heruo Railway were successfully completed. The task is fully completed.

The Heruo Railway is a key railway project planned by the state. It is a National Railway Class I railway connecting Hotan City and Ruoqiang County in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China. It is also a convenient transportation channel for the southern Xinjiang region to communicate with the northwest and southwest regions. The railway is led from the Hotan Station of the Southern Xinjiang Railway, and is connected to the Golmud-Korla Railway at Ruoqiang Station. A total of 9 new Luopu, Cele, Yuquan Town, Yutian, Minfeng, Nantun, Jinshan, Qiemo and Washixia will be built. Passenger station. Starting from Hotan City, Hotan Region, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China in the west, and reaching Ruoqiang County, Bayingoleng Mongolian Autonomous Prefecture in the east, the line has a total length of 825.476 kilometers and a design speed of 120 kilometers per hour. The project officially started construction on December 20, 2018. On September 27, 2021, the entire line was laid and completed. On March 12, 2022, the Xinjiang Heruo Railway successfully passed the dynamic acceptance inspection. It is expected to open in June 2022. The common people are full of infinite dreams and joy.

The Heruo Railway is the longest railway in Xinjiang that has been built and laid across a seamless line at one time. The line passes through a long sandstorm area and is difficult to construct. The railway builders have overcome the adverse effects of hot and dry weather, heavy sandstorms, difficult construction conditions, and lack of resources along the line, and adopted bridges instead of roads and plants to prevent sandstorms and other methods to promote railway construction with high quality and efficiency. For the construction of this railway line, China spent a total of 22.15 billion yuan to complete the last link of the Taklimakan railway line. After this railway is put into operation, it will encircle the entire Tarim Basin together with the Huge Railway and the Southern Xinjiang Railway, becoming the world's first circular railway line that surrounds the desert.

How to Circle the Sea of Death

Taklimakan is called the sea of death, and it's not just the waves. It is not only the largest desert in my country, but also the area of mobile sand dunes in the desert is as high as 277,000 square kilometers, accounting for 82% of the total desert area. The strong winds in the Tarim Basin have created the mobile sand dunes of Taklimakan. Therefore, the prevention and control of sandstorms is the first priority in the construction of the Heruo Railway.

"During the construction process, two scientific and technological innovation achievements of this railway were applied for the first time in domestic railway construction projects," said Hu Guoxing, director of the Engineering Management Department of Xinjiang Heruo Railway Co., Ltd.

One is to use prefabricated assembly technology to build bridge piers in railway bridge construction. The Heruo Railway is located at the southern edge of the Taklimakan Desert, the second largest mobile desert in the world. Most of the lines pass through no-man’s land, which makes water inconvenient. It is difficult to use the traditional cast-in-place concrete method for bridge construction. In order to solve this problem, China Railway Bridge Bureau Group Co., Ltd. and Ruo Railway S3 Project Department carried out research on the application technology of prefabricated concrete structures. The bridge pier project adopts prefabricated assembly technology. The concrete components of the bridge piers are prefabricated and processed in the factory, and then transported to the site to "build building blocks". ”, precisely assembled. "This technology avoids the problems of surface cracking and maintenance difficulties in the construction of cast-in-place concrete in desert areas, and has the advantages of standardization of component production, convenient construction, energy saving and environmental protection." Ma Shiping, deputy general manager of the company, said that this technology is used in Nepal. A total of 434 piers were used in the construction of Yahe Bridge, Yatong Guziminluo Expressway Bridge and other bridges, which shortened the construction period and achieved excellent quality.

The other is the innovative application of intelligent agricultural irrigation technology, and the establishment of an intelligent networked control drip irrigation pipe network system in the sand control plant belt. The Heruo Railway has 534 kilometers distributed in the sandstorm area, and the wind and sand prevention is a problem. In order to solve this problem, the Heruo Railway has set up sand barriers, planted sand control shrubs such as Haloxylon ammonium and red willow, and laid reed squares on the entire line. Among them, 13 million plants such as Haloxylon ammonium and red willow are planted along the route.

It is the first railway in my country where sandstorm protection and engineering construction are implemented simultaneously. In the process of railway construction, the builders have implemented the concept of railway construction and sand control first. Compared with engineering sand control, plant sand control can fundamentally solve the problem. However, it takes time for plants to grow, and the effects of one year and two or three years on sand control are different. In view of the special reality of the surrounding geographical environment of the railway, the builders adopted the sand control mode of external resistance and internal solid, high external and low internal.

Construction of the railway started in 2018. Haloxylon and red willow were planted at the same time, and the intelligent drip irrigation system was laid simultaneously. Build a section, run a section. In order to solve the problem of water shortage in the desert, the builders used mobile phones to turn on and off the 'faucet' remotely, and applied an intelligent agricultural irrigation system to the Heruo Railway. This system has 13 ports in total, with a maximum depth of 280 meters and a coverage area of 113,510. mu. Through mobile phone control, it can not only ensure the water demand of plants but also save water. Today, if you look down from the air, you can see that the windbreak and sand-fixing belt, which stretches for more than 300 kilometers, is green and full of vitality, like a green Great Wall that protects the safe operation of railways. "This is the first time in China to use the automatic intelligent control drip irrigation pipe network system in the desert railway project." Hu Guoxing said.

In addition, the Heruo Railway has adopted a design plan of replacing roads with bridges in areas with particularly severe sandstorms, and built a sand-crossing bridge. There are 5 sand-crossing bridges on the whole line, with a total length of more than 40 kilometers. These overhead bridges can allow wind and sand to pass under the bridges, reducing the impact of wind and sand on the line and train operation.

Due to the harsh natural conditions in the construction of the desert railway and the difficulty of water use, the Heruo Railway used the application technology of prefabricated concrete structures in the process of building the bridge over the sand, which changed the previous practice of pouring bridge piers on site. The use of these new technologies and solutions also provides inspiration for the future construction of desert railways.

A railway for the benefit of all places

The Heruo Railway, which crosses the desert, is an extremely important railway in the world. The completion and opening of the Heruo Railway will further mark a new breakthrough in the development of China's railway industry.

The Heruo Railway has another special feature. It is the first railway in Xinjiang with the longest cross-section seamless line laid at one time. Because it is all made of seamless steel rails, the Heruo Railway is also known as a track for a thousand miles. Compared with ordinary rails, since seamless rails eliminate a large number of rail joints, the impact force of joints is eliminated, noise pollution and line damage are reduced. It also saves raw materials, and line maintenance can save 30%-75% of costs. And as a passenger, the ride experience will be more comfortable as the train runs more smoothly on seamless steel tracks.

The Heruo Railway is located on the southern edge of the Taklimakan Desert, the world's second largest mobile desert known as the Sea of Death. It is another railway loop in Xinjiang after the formation of the Northern Xinjiang Railway Loop in 2020. Longwan Scenic Area and Uluwati Scenic Area. Along the long history, the famous Silk Road passed through here, leaving hundreds of precious monuments and ancient legends. At the same time, it connects many famous cultural heritage sites and natural heritage sites in Qinghai, Gansu, Tibet and even Sichuan. It is a tourist channel that runs through the east and west. After the opening and operation of the Heruo Railway, it will end the history of inaccessible trains in Qiemo County in Bazhou, Minfeng County, Yutian County in Hotan, and many towns in Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. It will also bring hope to the road of poverty alleviation. . The journey of Hotan people out of Xinjiang has been shortened by more than 1,000 kilometers than before, and products from all parts of southern Xinjiang will be shipped to the mainland faster, and transportation costs can be cut in half. At the same time, Akchar melons from Hotan, grapes from Keke Tiereke, jujubes from Minfeng, black chicken from Niya and snow chrysanthemum from Kunlun will all fly into the homes of the people in the mainland more conveniently, and the sea of death will be from now on. come alive.

As we all know, Hotan is a particularly famous tourist scenic spot, and the beauty of Hotan is even more coveted. The dune landscape outside the car window alone makes people overwhelmed. Mr. Zhu Zhenda, a desert scientist, said that Taklimakan is a museum of aeolian landforms. In this largest desert in China, there are the most dune landscapes, such as crescent-shaped dune chains, linear dunes, pyramid-shaped dunes, fish-scale dunes, and ridge-shaped dunes. Sand dunes, red willows grow between the dunes, and where there is water, you can also see pieces of Populus euphratica. However, due to the inconvenience of transportation, many scenic spots in Hotan are kept in the boudoir. The opening of the Heruo Railway will bring tourists to appreciate the mysterious beauty of southern Xinjiang, and at the same time drive the development of tourism industry in southern Xinjiang.

The construction of the Heruo Railway not only strongly promotes tourism in southern Xinjiang to enter the fast lane, but also drives the rapid development of commerce, catering, transportation and other related service industries, thereby helping local people get rid of poverty and become rich, embark on a well-off road, and become a circle of life in beautiful southern Xinjiang.Editor/Zhao E