A 950-ton steel tunnel-boring machine named Harriet that carved out 2 miles of earth for a light rail line headed to Los Angeles International Airport will be dismantled underneath South Los Angeles on Friday.

A year after beginning subterranean work digging LA Metro’s extended Crenshaw/LAX Line, Harriet will be hauled out of LA Metro’s future Leimert Park Station in pieces.

Giving the machine a female name is a long tradition among tunneling engineers.

“Like ships, tunnel-boring machines are named before they begin work for the first time to bring good luck,” according to a Metro statement. “A female name is chosen because, historically, underground workers looked to Saint Barbara for protection. She is the patron saint for military engineers (and) miners.”

Crenshaw/LAX Line

Since last April, the 400-foot-long tunnel borer — which has a cutter head on its front shield that removes dirt like a cheese grater — dug two tunnels beneath Crenshaw Boulevard for the line’s extension from the Green Line in El Segundo to the Expo Line in South LA.

Eight new stations are under construction in the Crenshaw District, Inglewood, Westchester and LAX. They will open in fall 2019. In addition to serving the airport, the line will brush near the new NFL stadium rising in Inglewood that will be the home of the Rams and Chargers.

An average of 60 feet per day of tunnel was dug during the year Harriet spent working underground with a 15-member crew. All together, holes the equivalent length of 30 football fields were dug. Progress moved at a rate of about 3 inches per minute, according to Metro officials.

“Part of the process is to pull her out of the underground hole. Right now, she’s outside the tunnel inside the station,” said Metro spokesman Jose Ubaldo. “We’re going to have cake (Friday morning) and take pictures before she’s dismantled and taken away.”

Harriet’s next job hasn’t been announced. But SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said earlier this year that he plans to buy a tunnel-boring machine to learn how to improve the speed and efficiency of tunnel digging as an underground pedestrian bridge is dug for employees.

Harriet going to SpaceX?

SpaceX is building an underground pedestrian tunnel across from its Crenshaw Boulevard headquarters for workers to safely cross the street to the parking garage. Musk said that, as they dig the tunnel, SpaceX engineers will try to work out how to improve tunneling efficiency.

“We’re going to get this machine, take it apart, figure out how to make it go much faster while still being safe and not affecting people on the surface,” Musk said in January. “We’ll see how much progress we can make, but I’m optimistic tunneling can be improved by at least five-fold, maybe 10-fold. That’s really key to a lot of technologies — road tunnels, train tunnels, Hyperloop tunnels.”

SpaceX submitted tunnel-digging plans to Hawthorne city officials just a few days after Harriet’s work on the LAX/Crenshaw Line finished on April 6.

The vertical tunnel shaft is complete. The next step is to dig the 500-foot-long horizontal pedestrian tunnel.

“This tunneling will be conducted by excavating a large bore pit almost 20 feet by 150 feet and 13.5-foot diameter,” said Arnie Shadbehr, Hawthorne’s interim city manager. “Currently, plans are being reviewed by the city as well as the Fire Department.”

Harriet’s diameter of 21.5 feet would accommodate the SpaceX tunnel. As tunnel-boring machines go, she’s relatively small.