Here's a plot idea to go with it; an alien craft crashes into Earth; with a small brain like alien aboard; with the ship wrecked the alien uses its technopathic abilities to seek out a new machine It finds Chuggy and they merge; but Chuggy starts to develop a new persona that fights the alien for control; eventually forcing it to be little more than an internal organ to the drill The chugging machine becomes hellbent on revenge and drilling to the core to destroy the planet The Doctor feeling mercy for the new bio-tech life form has to travel back in time to find the driver of the chuggy on the final day, to convince him to take at least part of the machine with him to France Back in the present finding the older man the doctor retrieves the piece and reunites it with Chuggy AI Chuggy merges with the missing part - gaining "memories" or at least some machine equivalent and causing him to stop his rampage The doctor goes to free the alien but finds the two have so fully merged that it would be impossible to separate them without killing them So he takes them to the future and finds them a home with a terraforming colony where they can tunnel and build forever
Ok, that boring machines story is sad. I already cried my heart out when my car got dented and imagined the car sobbing when i first found it. Probably will hear a ghastly cry if i ever pass through that bit in the Eurotunnel...
OMG I'm glad I found this again finally 🤣 I caught him doing a small show in Dublin during this tour and he did this bit. My face and stomach were still hurting the following evening from laughing. #pooroldchuggy.
I remember when you did this routine in Gothenburg years ago and everyone laughed. We got "No sympathy for diggers" for the #YouHadToBeThere. Good times
There was a children's book that I read as a kid about a steam shovel and it's engineer. The book ended with the shovel digging the basement for a high rise apartment. The company that owned it was going to scrap the steam shovel after this job because diesel power was the future. When the hole was done, oops! The engineer had neglected to include a ramp to crawl the digger out. They ended up selling the steamer to the building's owner for use heating the apartments. The Engineer was hired to be the maintenance man for the building and to operate the boiler.
It’s like a contemporary version of the final scenes of Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men” - ‘Tell us about the rabbits George, tell us about the rabbits.’ 🙁🐇🐇🐇☹️
I heard that it was only the digger from the UK side that got left in the mud. The French digger was left beside the tunnel entrance for a while. I heard it on QI, so the part about the sign saying "For sale. One careful owner." was probably a joke.
@@fussyboy2000 you remember rubbish. The tunneler Virginie, with its 350 tons, is still exposed, visitable, and carefully maintained as a witness to the engineering and political endeavour that was the Channel Tunnel. Of course, that was another time. Before tabloid campaigns geared up, and the BBC's recalling of history stopped their attempts at de-mythification of british history in the early 2000s.
Was it the one that got turned into a boiler for all the apartments, because the company was gonna scrap it anyway after it was done, and the engineer tried to save by turning it into the boiler for the entire complex?
@@sevenprovincesI mean, googling it, I get multiple sourcs saying the French TBM was dismantled and the U.K. TBM was turned aside and buried. My original source was an episode of QI, I believe... but now also Google is backing that up.
Same here. Although I got that information from QI and admittedly haven't bother to fact-check. (Also, I'm not a comedian. Maybe the joke worked better this way.)
@@sevenprovinces First hit I found was on the RobbinsTBM website (company who apparently built five of the machines used to dig the chunnel) which just says a French TBM was dismantled, but makes no mention of what happened after that. Wikipedia says a French machine was left in the ground until it was sold and dismantled much later then shipped to Turkey to dig out another tunnel. And that's the last thing I can find on the topic. So it's kind of unclear. I assume nobody thought to chronicle the adventures of a piece of industrial earth-moving equipment on the off-chance people might suddenly become invested in the machine's life story 25 years later.
Oh Dara! ♥ Incidentally John Oliver made a sketch recently on 'Last Week Tonight' featuring a character in Thomas the Tank Engine getting 'bricked up' because he wasn't carrying the freight. An actual episode of Thomas the tank engine it turned out! th-cam.com/video/AJ2keSJzYyY/w-d-xo.html And I thought Dutch cartoons like Alfred J. Kwak could be brutal with their depiction of a crow named 'Dolf' who claimed that flying birds were superior over aquatic birds and starting his 'Crows party' - to explain to children the advent of National Socialism and its part in Dutch history.
It’s a great story, but the Tunnel Boring Machines were basically disposable. A total of 11 were used, and only one was left buried. One of the others was sold on eBay. [Source: Institution of Civil Engineers.]
Not sure any of the chuggy story is true, my dad worked on the project advising how to safely take the boring machine out on the uk side. And wikipedia states that the uk one was on display and then sold and the french one is still displayed.
You'd think they'd make these boring machines with a reverse gear so they could be disassembled and used on another project instead of just being buried.
IIRC, the French machine was disassembled and brought out as a memorial. Jobs like Chunnel are so long that, by the time they're done, the machines are a bit like a fifteen-year-old Toyota Camry --still working okay but not likely to have resale value to a builder trying to win any new building contracts of a similar size.
@@BlackEpyon Try getting a multi-billion dollar syndicate to back a project relying on a gently used bit of decade-and-a-half-year-old tunnelling equipment where the entire project literally and physically rides on its performance. It's NOT comparable to some sixty-year-old reliable donkey-engine excavator ferreting away at the same cliff face or pit mine. Sixty-year-old excavators that break down usually have parts and systems that can be bodged back together on the fly with some improvisation. Modern TBMs? --not so much. Also, I was making a particular analogy to outdated but popular car models for a similar reason. Try selling one to a spanking new customer with the kind of money to invest in billion-dollar mega projects. They'll escort you off their premises. They won't care if your half-rusted 2007 Toyota still starts reliably on the first turn of the key. They'd want a G-Wagon or similar. Likely their cook at home drives a BMW sedan or Audi product.
I think that, by the tie the boring machine had dug all that much, there would have been so much mechanical wear on its internals that it wasn't economical to repair it, it would be practically the same as buiding one from scratch. Those machines, especially the vry gbig ones, are less vehicles than they areslightly mobile buildings.
@@Bazookatone1 You'd have to disassemble it to take it to the next job site anyways, but factoring all that in would determine the economics of reusing it, I suppose.
You know the pumps in the Chunnel? They are not pumping water, it is the tears of Chuggy.
Now thats a Doctor Who episode if ever I heard one "The Tears of Chuggy"
Here's a plot idea to go with it; an alien craft crashes into Earth; with a small brain like alien aboard; with the ship wrecked the alien uses its technopathic abilities to seek out a new machine
It finds Chuggy and they merge; but Chuggy starts to develop a new persona that fights the alien for control; eventually forcing it to be little more than an internal organ to the drill
The chugging machine becomes hellbent on revenge and drilling to the core to destroy the planet
The Doctor feeling mercy for the new bio-tech life form has to travel back in time to find the driver of the chuggy on the final day, to convince him to take at least part of the machine with him to France
Back in the present finding the older man the doctor retrieves the piece and reunites it with Chuggy
AI Chuggy merges with the missing part - gaining "memories" or at least some machine equivalent and causing him to stop his rampage
The doctor goes to free the alien but finds the two have so fully merged that it would be impossible to separate them without killing them
So he takes them to the future and finds them a home with a terraforming colony where they can tunnel and build forever
It gets me. Every. Single. Time.
Chuggy knew what he signed up to, it's his kids that I feel sorry for.
Here's hoping Chuggy at least had some Amontillado waiting for him.
Can't wait for the Revenge of the Machines, with Chuggy leading the way.
Ok, that boring machines story is sad. I already cried my heart out when my car got dented and imagined the car sobbing when i first found it. Probably will hear a ghastly cry if i ever pass through that bit in the Eurotunnel...
And poor chuggy is still waiting. I am bereft 😢😂😅
Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel!!!
Chuggy could have Lived! HE COULD HAVE LLLIIIIVVVVVEDDDD!!!
This genuinely choked me up 😢 damn you Dara, you made me cry over machinery 🤦🏽
me too. It's like taking your old dog to the vet for the Last Time
@@judythompson8227 mate, why tho..
OMG I'm glad I found this again finally 🤣 I caught him doing a small show in Dublin during this tour and he did this bit. My face and stomach were still hurting the following evening from laughing. #pooroldchuggy.
#savethediggers
#moreladders
#pooroldchuggy 😥 RIP Chuggy
this is my favorite of all his bits
I remember when you did this routine in Gothenburg years ago and everyone laughed. We got "No sympathy for diggers" for the #YouHadToBeThere. Good times
Excellent! Thanks for sharing and the education, too
This is one of my favourite stand-up routines of all time
There was a children's book that I read as a kid about a steam shovel and it's engineer.
The book ended with the shovel digging the basement for a high rise apartment.
The company that owned it was going to scrap the steam shovel after this job because diesel power was the future.
When the hole was done, oops! The engineer had neglected to include a ramp to crawl the digger out.
They ended up selling the steamer to the building's owner for use heating the apartments. The Engineer was hired to be the maintenance man for the building and to operate the boiler.
Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel. The steam shovel was called Mary Anne.
Chuggy knows what he did.
think chuggy will try to dig its way out?
@@GravesRWFiAYep. That's another good reason to remember to put the bog seat down, boys...🚽👀
It’s like a contemporary version of the final scenes of Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men” - ‘Tell us about the rabbits George, tell us about the rabbits.’ 🙁🐇🐇🐇☹️
I think about that every time I hear this bit 😂
I heard that it was only the digger from the UK side that got left in the mud.
The French digger was left beside the tunnel entrance for a while.
I heard it on QI, so the part about the sign saying "For sale. One careful owner." was probably a joke.
Not a joke, it's still there, with the sign. It was one of several that were worn out during the process of digging. (there were more than two)
@@jmackmcneill IIRC it was eventually sold for scrap.
@@fussyboy2000 you remember rubbish.
The tunneler Virginie, with its 350 tons, is still exposed, visitable, and carefully maintained as a witness to the engineering and political endeavour that was the Channel Tunnel.
Of course, that was another time. Before tabloid campaigns geared up, and the BBC's recalling of history stopped their attempts at de-mythification of british history in the early 2000s.
@@canicheenrage The one we had in the UK was sold for scrap. It appears that Virginie was kept on the French side and still exists.
Love you Dara
Feck it Dara, sell this story idea to Aardman studios. Poor Chuggy.
Chuggy has escaped and is now stealthily tunnelling around getting his revenge. What do you think causes sink-holes...?
Genius😂
#justiceforchuggy
In another life, "Chuggy" and "Le Chugge?" both went to Las Vegas and helped Danny Ocean bring about the downfall of Willy Banks...
#ChuggysLifeMatters
#WeStandForChuggy
“Chuggy” used to be my nickname due to being able to down a pint of Guinness in less than 2 seconds.
Not proud. Much.
REMEMBER CHUGGY!
CHUGGY LIVES MATTER!
My child brought home a book from school where the digger gets left in a massive hole. It did have eyes. It even had friends
Was it the one that got turned into a boiler for all the apartments, because the company was gonna scrap it anyway after it was done, and the engineer tried to save by turning it into the boiler for the entire complex?
Yes! I think so
The Digger!!!
Dara makes us care about things we needn't care about. But we don't care.
It was my understanding that only the british left theirs behind and that France disassembled theirs and it's sitting in a museum or something.
Trying to google it, but from what I understand all the TBM's (or Tunnel Boring Machines) were buried.
@@sevenprovincesI mean, googling it, I get multiple sourcs saying the French TBM was dismantled and the U.K. TBM was turned aside and buried. My original source was an episode of QI, I believe... but now also Google is backing that up.
Same here. Although I got that information from QI and admittedly haven't bother to fact-check.
(Also, I'm not a comedian. Maybe the joke worked better this way.)
One of the boring machine is displayed near Folkestone with à for sale sign…@@sevenprovinces
@@sevenprovinces First hit I found was on the RobbinsTBM website (company who apparently built five of the machines used to dig the chunnel) which just says a French TBM was dismantled, but makes no mention of what happened after that.
Wikipedia says a French machine was left in the ground until it was sold and dismantled much later then shipped to Turkey to dig out another tunnel. And that's the last thing I can find on the topic.
So it's kind of unclear. I assume nobody thought to chronicle the adventures of a piece of industrial earth-moving equipment on the off-chance people might suddenly become invested in the machine's life story 25 years later.
#PoorOldChuggy
And the unfortunate fate of the merry Digger 🥺
New shoe Davey the Digger Dies short show but it was what he would have wanted lol
This was depressing enough to make me glad that I use an adblocker.
#PauvreVieuxChuggy
Wow, comment the first. Possibly my first ever first comment. Top job Dara. Always excellent. Highly commendable. Cheers
the more the hit this story gets the more certain it is that chuggy is going to some day be dug up and out from the tunnel
NOOOOOOOO CHUGGY
Oh it's funny now but when the AI take over they'll remember Chuggy.
And the starry-eyed little Digger, who just wanted to see Paris 🦨
Oh Dara! ♥
Incidentally John Oliver made a sketch recently on 'Last Week Tonight' featuring a character in Thomas the Tank Engine getting 'bricked up' because
he wasn't carrying the freight. An actual episode of Thomas the tank engine it turned out!
th-cam.com/video/AJ2keSJzYyY/w-d-xo.html
And I thought Dutch cartoons like Alfred J. Kwak could be brutal with their depiction of a crow named 'Dolf' who claimed that flying birds were superior
over aquatic birds and starting his 'Crows party' - to explain to children the advent of National Socialism and its part in Dutch history.
I think it says a lot about humanity that we're upset about Chuggy
It’s a great story, but the Tunnel Boring Machines were basically disposable. A total of 11 were used, and only one was left buried.
One of the others was sold on eBay.
[Source: Institution of Civil Engineers.]
It's a stand up comedy routine, not a Ted Talk.
Not sure any of the chuggy story is true, my dad worked on the project advising how to safely take the boring machine out on the uk side. And wikipedia states that the uk one was on display and then sold and the french one is still displayed.
Hooray! Chuggy lives!
Another commentator cites the Institution of Civil Engineers: they used 11 machines in all. Only the last was buried.
You'd think they'd make these boring machines with a reverse gear so they could be disassembled and used on another project instead of just being buried.
IIRC, the French machine was disassembled and brought out as a memorial. Jobs like Chunnel are so long that, by the time they're done, the machines are a bit like a fifteen-year-old Toyota Camry --still working okay but not likely to have resale value to a builder trying to win any new building contracts of a similar size.
@@puirYorick 15 years is old? There's mining excavators that have been in use since the late 60's!
@@BlackEpyon Try getting a multi-billion dollar syndicate to back a project relying on a gently used bit of decade-and-a-half-year-old tunnelling equipment where the entire project literally and physically rides on its performance. It's NOT comparable to some sixty-year-old reliable donkey-engine excavator ferreting away at the same cliff face or pit mine. Sixty-year-old excavators that break down usually have parts and systems that can be bodged back together on the fly with some improvisation. Modern TBMs? --not so much. Also, I was making a particular analogy to outdated but popular car models for a similar reason. Try selling one to a spanking new customer with the kind of money to invest in billion-dollar mega projects. They'll escort you off their premises. They won't care if your half-rusted 2007 Toyota still starts reliably on the first turn of the key. They'd want a G-Wagon or similar. Likely their cook at home drives a BMW sedan or Audi product.
I think that, by the tie the boring machine had dug all that much, there would have been so much mechanical wear on its internals that it wasn't economical to repair it, it would be practically the same as buiding one from scratch. Those machines, especially the vry gbig ones, are less vehicles than they areslightly mobile buildings.
@@Bazookatone1 You'd have to disassemble it to take it to the next job site anyways, but factoring all that in would determine the economics of reusing it, I suppose.
wtf
Well, that routine was boring!
No.