Marine 69-71, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

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Mule Pass Tunnel

* on the Old Bisbee Tour and Copper City Territory Tour

• Construction work started on the tunnel on January 9, 1957.

• The Mule Pass Tunnel was opened in a dedication ceremony on December 19, 1958. 

• Two governors dedicated the tunnel, exiting Governor Mac McFarland and incoming Governor Paul Fannin along with State Engineer W.E. Wiley.

• The tunnel is part of highway US 80.

• The original path of highway US 80 went over the top of the divide and was treacherous to drive.

• A $2 million project.

• Close to 150 workers were on the job. It took them five months of digging, drilling, and blasting, day and night from June to November 1957, to bore through 1,400 feet of granite to daylight on the other side of the mountain.

• Arizona's longest highway tunnel.

• The old divide road, NW of the tunnel, can still be seen from US 80. It's now used as a hiking trail.

• The old divide road SE of the tunnel is available to drive with spectacular views.

• According to a Bisbee Radio Project report, locals sometimes refer to Mule Pass Tunnel as a “time tunnel” in which travelers emerge from the eastern end into an earlier era of Bisbee.

• Is 43 feet (14 m) wide and 1,400 feet (430 m) long.

• You're supposed to hold your breath when traveling through the tunnel.

• Icicles hang from the ceiling cracks during occasional winter storms.

• Local school athletes blast and sing songs after wins on their bus ride home. In my time, we sang "We Are The Champions" by Queen and continued the singing through Old Bisbee.

Marine 69-71, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons