One faulty fan gridlocked thousands of hapless commuters on the M5

EditorialJuly 29, 2026 — 5:02pmIn a global city such as Sydney, a place where people want to live and work, it will never be possible to prevent congestion. But the major traffic delays experienced by motorists during the morning peak on Sydney’s M5 motorway while a tunnel ventilator fan was repaired could fairly be described as a commuting catastrophe.The tunnel on the M5 motorway was closed for more than six hours on Wednesday, and city-bound traffic backed up more than 13 kilometres at times as crew with cranes worked to fix the fan.The toll road operator Transurban had closed the two-lane tunnel to conduct routine maintenance in the early hours of Wednesday when workers discovered safety problems with a fan inside the tunnel. A decision was made on safety grounds about 4.16am to replac