A pair of construction workers have been detained after allegedly using an excavator to dig through the Great Wall of China to make a shortcut, local authorities said. The 38-year-old man and 55-year-old woman were working near the Unesco world heritage site in the central Shanxi province and are accused of making a “big gap” in the wall by widening an existing aperture so that their excavator could pass through it, cutting the distance they had to travel. Police say the pair caused “irreversible damage to the integrity of the Ming Great Wall and to the safety of the cultural relics.” Authorities were alerted to the damage late last month after reports of a large new gap appearing in the structure.