Sicily, the Greek word for "three heads", refers to the triangular topography of Sicily.

The land here is rich, the climate is warm and the scenery is beautiful...... Most areas with volcanoes are fertile because volcanic ash is the best fertilizer.

The island is rich in citrus, lemons and olives, and is also known as the "Golden Basin" because of its favorable natural environment for developing agriculture and forestry.

But Qin Chuan and the others could not appreciate the beauty of this scenery at all, because when they arrived here, Sicily had been bombed by the Allies for three weeks......

During these three weeks, the U.S. military carried out extensive and fierce air strikes on Sicily's ports, airports, roads, railways (Sicily has two railways, one around the island and the other through the central part of the island), troop concentrations, and radar stations.

Qin Chuan and the others had only experienced this in a few hours after they landed on the island...... As soon as the sky dawned, the roar of rumbling planes could be heard in the sky, and sometimes you often couldn't even see the shadows of the planes, because they were above the clouds at an altitude of 10,000 meters, and all you could see was rows of bombs falling from the clouds, and then smashing out large craters on the island.

"I can almost smell bombs!" Werner said: "And the dust it blows up! ”

"Come on!" Alfredo laughed, "That's the smell of a volcano!" ”

"There's a volcano here?" Werner's eyes were full of surprise.

"Of course, Etna!" Alfredo looked at Werner with a puzzled face: "It is the largest active volcano in Europe, and you didn't even know it existed?" ”

"All he knows is where there's a baseball field!" The baker said.

"So...... Can we see it? Werner asked Alfredo: "I forgot that you are Italian!" ”

"Of course!" Alfredo nodded: "It is also the highest mountain in Italy, at 3,323 meters above sea level, you only need to ......"

As he spoke, Alfredo looked around, pointed to a high place to the east, and said, "Climb there, and look east to see it!" It's best to go and see it at night! ”

"Why?"

"Because it often spews smoke and fire, it can be seen very clearly at night!"

"God!" Werner's eyes widened: "It's an active volcano!"

Alfredo looked at Werner with incredulous eyes: "Please, Sergeant, of course it's an active volcano, otherwise there would be ash everywhere!" ”

"What if it erupts?"

"Then we won't have to hide here and dig a tunnel!" Dominic said: "It is best that the stones from the volcano can sink the British warship!" ”

"And we, too, will be burned to ashes by lava!" The baker said.

"Can you stop discussing something useless?" Kuhn couldn't help but interrupt their discussion: "Think about what to do with these springs!" ”

Kuhn was right, an abundance of groundwater might be a good thing for a soldier from the desert, but it was a hassle for building fortifications. Not to mention that the construction of the tunnel has become much more difficult, the fragile parts need to be supported with more wood, and the dampness in the tunnel is unbearable, and hiding in it is like hiding in a stinky ditch.

Qin Chuan also recognized this problem...... And there doesn't seem to be a good solution to this, all that can be done is reinforcement and drainage.

"Captain!" At this time, Colonel Slane shouted at Qin Chuan from more than ten meters away.

Qin Chuan turned his head to look and understood what he meant when he saw Major General Neumann beside Colonel Slain.

Sure enough, when Qin Chuan caught up, Major General Neumann warmly shook Qin Chuan's hand: "Captain, I didn't expect us to meet so soon!" ”

"General!" Qin Chuan said: "You are here for the matter of the tunnel!" ”

"Yes!" Major General Neumann nodded: "The soil here is different from the Gabez defense line, and in some places, as long as you dig deeper, spring water will gush out, and it will start to collapse if you don't dig deep!" ”

"It's not impossible to build!" Qin Chuan said: "You need a lot of wood to support, and you also need to do a good job of drainage measures, such as digging the tunnel slightly up, so that the tunnel can drain the water on its own without accumulating water!" ”

"Good way!" Major Normanyi nodded: "I'll let them try it right away!" ”

"General!" Qin Chuan stopped Major General Neumann and said, "I'm worried that it will be too much work to continue to build fortifications like this, and the enemy will already be in front of us before we build enough fortifications!" Other than that...... Even if such fortifications are built, they may not be able to defend against artillery! ”

Major General Neumann nodded, the tunnel fortifications mainly rely on a thick layer of soil to prevent artillery, but if the soil layer itself is easy to collapse because of too much groundwater, let alone anti-artillery, even if there is no gunner, people hiding in it may be buried alive.

"Captain!" After a pause, Major General Neumann asked with a puzzled expression: "Do you have any other way to build fortifications?" ”

Qin Chuan nodded: "We need stronger fortifications, but because of the limited time, it may be a little simpler, but the anti-artillery ...... I believe it is still possible! ”

Then Qin Chuan chose a relatively flat slope and asked the soldiers to dig a trench horizontally......

Major General Neumann and the soldiers looked a little puzzled, the construction of tunnel fortifications is all vertical, but what is the use of Qin Chuan letting them dig a horizontal trench?!

However, the soldiers still did as Qin Chuan said, because the soil was soft and the soldiers were also very experienced in building trenches...... They all dug trenches, and it wasn't long before a trench appeared in front of everyone.

The next step is to reinforce the logs on the inner wall of the trenches, and after the completion of the logs, use the logs to lay a layer on the top of the trenches, then lay a layer of soil on it, and then lay a layer horizontally on the soil to do it, and then another layer and finally add camouflage.

In this way, everyone can see that this is actually a tunnel...... And it is obviously much stronger than the longitudinal tunnel, because its structure is basically made of logs.

On the surface, it seems to be a lot of work, because it requires a lot of logs to be laid on top of each other, but in fact it is much easier and faster.

There is only one opening in the longitudinal tunnel, and when digging in, at most one or two people are digging inside, and the rest of the people are carrying soil outside.

The horizontal tunnels are dug by everyone, and the logs can be taken locally, so the total workload is much less.

Major General Neumann climbed inside and hid, and when he came out, he said with surprise and joy: "Captain, you are simply a genius, how did you know this method of building a tunnel?" This kind of tunnel is simply designed for this soft ground! ”