Eurotunnel's team has accessed the scene of the fire that struck last month.

While the investigation into the blaze is continuing, Eurotunnel has been able to send workers down into the North tunnel to clean the site of the blaze, in preparation for an examination of the damage.

Parts of the burnt Shuttle began to be moved out of the tunnel on Ocotber 1 and Eurotunnel has said it aims to have a full service through the tunnel restored in six months.

The company believes it lost an estimated 22m Euro in revenue as a result of the fire. Operations were completely shut down for 30 hours after the conflagration on September 11, although they were soon built up.

In a statement it said: “As a result of the committment of Eurotunnel’s personnel, as much of the infrastructure as possible was brought back into service by September 29 (five out of six tunnel intervals) restoring an almost normal capacity to Eurostar and allowing more than half the normal capacity for Eurotunnel’s Shuttles with significantly higher load factors.”

Eurotunnel’s revenues for the third quarter of 2008 were down six per cent, to 189 million Euro. Without the fire they would have been increased by five per cent.

The cost of the fire went beyond the simple loss of train services as Operation Stack needed to be implemented and the M20 is still suffering from lane closures around Folkestone should Stack be needed again soon.

Eurostar’s plans to reintroduce a Brussels service from Ashford were also put on hold, pending the full reopening of the tunnel.

Eurotunnel was insured for material damage and operating losses due to business interuption up to 900m Euro – equivalent to a year’s revenues. Their excess? 10 million Euro.

Priority was given to Eurostar when the Channel Tunnel began running again.

This meant that Eurostar has been operating an almost-normal traffic level, with journey times extended by around 20 minutes.