BOSTON (WHDH) - Flames, falling debris and flood waters have sparked concerns for drivers traveling through Boston’s tunnels.
Over the past year, commuters have faced severe disruptions—from a chunk of concrete falling in the Prudential Tunnel to a multi-car fire that sent blinding smoke across the highway, to flooding that filled the Ted Williams Tunnel with several feet of water.
“Just like nothing we’ve ever seen before, so that was probably the most startling thing of wow this is actually happening and what do we do about it and how do we get ourselves out of here safely,” said Lauralyn Dyer who was headed to the airport when the fire broke out in the Ted Williams tunnel last May.
She said she was just a few cars behind the fire when she heard an explosion.
“It was kind of rising fairly quickly and when we exited the tunnel we could see this huge plume of black smoke coming out of it,” Dyer remembered.
Other drivers chose to flee the tunnel and abandon their cars.
Months later, Samaily Sanchez also had a close call as she was driving through the Prudential Tunnel when concrete fell from the ceiling.
“Our hearts dropped. We were like, ‘Oh my God. We cannot believe that happened,’” remembered Sanchez.
Back in February, she was driving to the Boston Children’s Museum in the middle of the afternoon when traffic came to a sudden halt.
“It was just scary. I didn’t know if more was going to come down,” Sanchez said.
She estimated it was just two minutes away from hitting her car.
“I was literally shaking afterward,” she said. “I feel like something like this could have been prevented.”
7 Investigates obtained copies of inspection reports for the Prudential Tunnel from the last few years. Various reports dated from 2021 – 2024 detailed ‘widespread areas of active leakage’, chipped concrete and cracks in critical areas that support hanging elements.
One inspection even found a structural element had severely deteriorated and inspectors noted it “could present a falling concrete hazard.”
Former Boston transportation commissioner and Massachusetts Turnpike Authority tunnel superintendent John Vitagliano said issues like growing cracks and leaks are early warning signs of potential structural weakness inside tunnels.
Vitagliano said the recent incidents across Boston tunnels have surprised him.
“I’ve been very much taken aback,” he told 7 Investigates. “I would have expected better.”
Vitagliano reviewed the inspections and believes a similar incident, like the concrete falling in the Prudential Tunnel, could occur in any Boston tunnel.
“The one word that stands out in my mind is leakage because leakage is a major cause of so many of the potential threats we see in tunnel systems,” he said.
7 Investigates obtained the most recent inspections for all the major tunnels in the Boston area.
Many of the reports detailed leaks with some up to 100 drips per minute, a rate that exceeds the state’s acceptable level. In one case inspectors noted that the leak was left unaddressed since the last inspection.
In other cases, reports showed leaks were growing and leading to cracked concrete. Photos from inspections even reveal stalactites, which resemble icicles, forming on tunnel ceilings.
“There is not a tunnel in the world that is built on the water that doesn’t have some kind of minor leakage but that’s what a good inspector, maintenance system, is supposed to do is to identify those and catch them before they get out of hand,” Vitagliano explained.
Inspections also detailed a widespread problem of clogged drains across the tunnel system. Many were 100% clogged with debris, while others had worsened since the last inspection.
“Just the fact that the drains were allowed to get as clogged as they were is an indication to me that the inspection procedure itself was seriously flawed in that respect,” Vitagliano said.
He called the clogs major red flags and pointed to the feet of flooding in the Ted Williams tunnel as an example of what is at stake. Transportation officials attributed that flooding to intense rain and a drainage clog.
Fire hazards are another concern within tunnels. Again, 7 Investigates found several inspections that pointed to missing and deteriorated fireproofing, faulty ventilation and blocked vents. Vitagliano said these are all critical parts of the system designed to help control smoke and ventilation during a fire.
In other instances, 7 Investigates found various instances of detached or missing clips meant to hold equipment and lighting in place.
Inspection records do show workers taking some corrective action in some instances and flagging action items for immediate repair.
The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) maintains the tunnels. Each tunnel is thoroughly inspected every two years and critical areas are reviewed more frequently.
Jonathan Gulliver, MassDOT’s highway administrator, reassured drivers that tunnels are safe and said maintenance is conducted regularly.
“Our tunnel, our bridge system, is safe. We go through a huge amount of effort to maintain safety across all of our infrastructure,” Gulliver said.
Of the issues that 7 Investigates found in recent inspection reports, MassDOT confirmed a handful were fixed and around 75% of the problems are in the process of being addressed. Some of the defects in the Prudential Tunnel are the responsibility of the Air Rights tenants—entities that lease and develop property over the tunnel infrastructure.
Gulliver partially attributed two of the recent incidents, the flooding and falling debris, to New England weather. He said a cycle of freezing and thawing caused the cement in the Prudential Tunnel to weaken and collapse in February.
“It was a joint that had been stable up into that point but the type of weather that we had this last winter really was the kind that led to this freeze-thaw action acting on the joint and causing that concrete to fail,” he explained.
Gulliver did admit the incident has pushed MassDOT to change its policy regarding the timing and frequency of some inspections. He explained that, traditionally inspectors review certain joints in the spring but now they will conduct inspections earlier in the year following weather patterns rather than seasons.
“After looking at it and realizing that we could do better, we are going to do better. We’re changing our policies to address it,” Gulliver said.
When asked had this policy had been implemented earlier and if it would have prevented the cement collapse, Gulliver told 7 Investigates, “Ya, I think with a little bit more robust inspection practice, again moving the schedule up and really making it more focused around the actual weather conditions versus the season, we are going to be able to catch those into the future.”
In addition to changing its policy, MassDOT also installed overhead shielding in the Prudential Tunnel to catch any debris that may become loose. Inspectors also reviewed multiple other areas within the tunnel back in February and stated there were no other areas needing immediate repair.
Vitagliano supports more frequent inspection and would also like to see MassDOT conduct a comprehensive analysis of the tunnel system that accounts for factors like the changing climate patterns.
Vitagliano said he believes the tunnels are safe but not as safe as he thinks they could be. He hopes MassDOT will be even more proactive about maintenance in the future so issues don’t grow.
“I mean look we are talking about the potential loss of life here that could be attributed to those kinds of conditions,” Vitagliano said.
(Copyright (c) 2024 Sunbeam Television. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)