'Annie' arriving by barge earlier this week

A giant tunnelling machine set to create part of London’s new super sewer arrived in London this week, with parts unloaded from a ship onto the Greenwich Peninsula.

The machine will be used to create a connection tunnel linking Greenwich Pumping Station to the main super sewer in Bermondsey.

Named after Annie Scott Dill Russell, the first female scientist to work at the Greenwich Observatory, ‘Annie’ will be assembled on a site next to the O2 over the next few months before being transported 4km to Tideway’s site near Deptford Creek.

The connection tunnel, which passes through sites in Deptford and Surrey Quays, is a key part of Tideway’s work to protect the Thames from sewage pollution, which regularly spills into the river when it rains.

The machine, one of six giant tunnelling machines being used on the Tideway project, was built in Germany, shipped up the Rhine and sailed to London from Holland.

Four machines are already deep beneath London, creating the super sewer to protect the River Thames for generations to come.

'Annie' fully assembled at the factory in Germany