Leucosia and Ligea: the names you chose for the new TBMs on the Salerno–Reggio Calabria High-Speed Line

The contest launched to choose the names of the two new Tunnel Boring Machines (TBMs) that will excavate Lot 1A Battipaglia–Romagnano of the new Salerno–Reggio Calabria High-Speed Line concluded on November 7.

The most voted names were Leucosia and Ligea, inspired by the sirens of Greek mythology who, according to legend, dwelled along the shores of the Bay of Salerno.

The name Leucosia (Greek “Λευκωσία”, Leukōsía) means “the white one” or “the radiant one.” In mythology, she was one of the sirens, daughters of the river god Acheloos and the muse Melpomene. Like her sisters, she had the body of a woman and a bird (in the earliest versions) or of a fish (in later classical and Mediterranean traditions). Leucosia was said to inhabit the coasts of Cilento, and according to some authors, after throwing herself into the sea in despair for having failed to enchant Odysseus, her body was carried by the waves to the island that took her name—identified with Punta Licosa, near Castellabate (SA).

The name Ligea (Greek “Λίγεια”, Ligéia) means “clear-voiced” or “melodious.” According to the most widespread versions of the myth, Ligea lived in the waters off the Calabrian and Campanian coasts, and after her defeat by Odysseus or Orpheus, her body was found on the shores of Terina, an ancient city on the Tyrrhenian coast of Calabria, near present-day Lamezia Terme. For this reason, the legend of Ligea is often associated both with the Sea of Salerno and with the coasts of Tropea and Nicotera, symbolically linking the entire southern Tyrrhenian shoreline.

As tradition has it, giving a name to the tunnel boring machines is considered a good omen at the start of excavation works. Leucosia and Ligea, each equipped with a cutter head measuring 13.46 metres in diameter, together with Partenope – already in operation since last February for the excavation of the Saginara tunnel – represent the largest TBMs ever used by Ghella.