Ship Canal’s tunnel boring machine needs a name

Seattle Public Utilities is hosting a naming contest for the massive boring machine being used to dig a wastewater tunnel from Ballard to Wallingford.

The German tunnel machine has been under assembly for a few weeks now as part of the Ship Canal Water Quality Project, which includes the building of a 2.7-mile underground wastewater storage tunnel.

Early suggestions include Drill Nye the Boring Guy, Jimi HenDrillx, and Russell Drillson (see more below).

The SPU tunnel machine-naming contest is accepting name submissions until March 12th. People may submit machine names via Twitter with the #NameThatTBM or through the online submission form, which can be found here.

The Ship Canal team will select a few of their favorite names and put them to a public vote taking place from March 18th-24th. Check-in here during these dates to vote or sign up for SPU’s project email list here for updates.

For more information on the contest and the Ship Canal Water Quality Project, please visit here.