Morocco offers €11m for Strait tunnel as Spain seeks drilling method

Eleven million for a tunnel costing billions

Segarro has put **€11 million** on the table for the tunnel under the Strait of Gibraltar, and Spain is figuring out how to drill it. For a project of this scale, the figure sounds like a bad joke: critics say eleven million won't even cover the design phase. It is the type of announcement that resurfaces periodically and, in context, reflects more administrative circus than engineering reality, according to skeptics.

The reaction was swift. Some view the announcement as a PR stunt rather than a real infrastructure plan, while others question the money's origin: if Segarro contributes eleven million, one must ask how many euros previously left Spanish coffers. This distrust is not arbitrary; it stems from years of identical announcements without a single shovel hitting the seabed, say those challenging the project.

A project stuck in limbo for years

What is presented as news has a long history. The prevailing suspicion is that an **institutional front** exists—with its state-owned company and staff—whose sole purpose is to float trial balloons periodically to justify next year's budget. The logic is flawless: if the tunnel is never built, no one can prove the money was wasted.

Technical skepticism doesn't help either. Attention is drawn to the **economic unviability** of what would be the most expensive construction in history, and to a geological detail no one wants to face head-on: tectonic plates. Drilling beneath a seismically active strait is not the whim of bored engineers.

The tunnel as a metaphor for everything else

In the background lies the migration debate, with some arguing the infrastructure would only facilitate uncontrolled movement of people and goods. This is the political reading of a project that technically lacks even a route: there is irony suggesting one would have to start drilling in Salamanca to reach the necessary depth.

The realistic figure cited by skeptics is different: **€1 billion**, of which Segarro would contribute eleven million and Spain the rest. Seen this way, the Segarro gesture becomes a tip.

It remains to be seen if this time there is more than a press release. Given the track record, the tunnel will likely remain, another year longer, the most expensive project that never starts.