📚Reading📚

Around Arras, The soldiers dig their tunnels where the ground was soft.

They dug 30 meters below the surface in sandbags and scattered

them around carefully. Tunneling on the western front was dangerous

and frightening. Both sides worked really quickly to dig their tunnels

and explode their enemies before the enemy could get them. Carbon

monoxide was another killer that could be released underground anytime.

The poisonous gas was invisible and had no smell, so the soldiers carried

canaries and white mice in their cages. If the animals died then it would

give them a warning that they had to get out before they would die.

1.  What was the ground made of in Arras? Sandstone

 Add a picture to help explain. It is what they used to make the ground of Arras so the ground could be soft and easy to dig through.

 

2. What did miners use to dig the tunnels? Pickaxe and shovels

Add pictures.

 

3. How would an enemy plane be able to spot where a tunnel was being dug? They would see a distinctive white rock on brown soil.

4. Why was tunneling “a race against time”?

Both sides built a tunnel and they had to do it quickly before the other side would shot before you do,

5. Why did miners block the tunnel with sandbags after putting explosives in the end of the tunnel?  So they can´t die but the enemy died

6. In what ways could miners or soldiers be killed because of the tunnels? (more than one answer) Blown up from bombs Carbon monoxide, Too hot, 

7. What was the reason miners kept a canary or mouse in a cage inside the tunnel? 

They took the animals so if the canary stopped singing then the soldiers knew that there was carbon monoxide and they had to run out before they would die.




There were some officers that were off duty that found ancient quarries underneath Arras where the sandstone was mined to build the town. The British quickly released that the caverns could be used to extend the enemies so the soldiers could go safely underground. For over the next five months New Zealand tunnellers worked alongside the British in secret. The tunnels had to be wide enough for the soldiers to go through while the wounded men were carried on stretches in the other direction. There was a secret labyrinth that needed facilities such as toilets, cookhouse, chapels and a large hospital.

1`) What does “worked around the clock in 8 hours shifts” mean?

They take turns for somebody to dig the tunnels then that person would go and rest
and somebody else would take over.

2) How big were the caverns? Very large How do you know this? It was
said in the story

3) Why did the tunnels connecting the caverns need to be very wide? So the
soldiers could march through the tunnel while the wounded men were carried
in stretches.  How wide would you estimate they were? 

Like 2 or 3 meters wide

4) Why were these caverns kept a secret? Because they didn't want anyone else to know

5) What was the purpose of naming the caves? It helps them navigate.