The stress wave field around a tunnel in an anisotropic medium subject to shock load is analyzed using the dynamic photoelastic method. The influence of various factors on the distribution and magnitude of boundary stresses around the tunnel are studied by simulating the deformation process. The time dependence of the dynamic stress concentration factor on the tunnel walls is established Introduction. Simulation of refraction, reflection, and scattering of nonstationary waves by rock surfaces with different mechanical properties is especially important for the dynamic analysis of underground structures subject to seismic and blast waves.The photoelastic method was used in [4,5,7] to analyze the dynamic stress concentration around free circular holes in isotropic thin plates and anisotropic rock masses induced by longitudinal waves of different lengths. The blast source is assumed to be at a significant distance from the plate edges; hence, a longitudinal (Ð) wave alone is incident on the hole during diffraction. However, if a rock mass is modeled by a linear elastic medium (as usually done in designing ground support to withstand main types of load) [1] and waves propagate in the cross-sectional plane of a structure, then it is possible to use two-dimensional dynamic contact solutions of elasticity describing the stress concentration around free and reinforced holes of various shapes. Note that the currently available solutions can only be applied to a circular hole in an isotropic medium. If the hole is not circular and the medium is anisotropic, finding such solutions involves severe difficulties [8][9][10][11].1. Problem Formulation. We will use photoelastic models to study the dynamic stress state induced by blast waves around tunnels in an anisotropic rock mass near sloping free surface. The models are plates with the following geometry ( Fig. 1): à = 250 mm, b = 200 mm; h = 3 mm, d = 35 mm, f = 40 mm; and ñ 1 = 105, ñ 2 = 93, ñ 3 = 40 mm (Fig. 1). The plates are made of an optically sensitive orthotropic material with the following characteristics: Å 1 = 7.10⋅10 3 ÌPà, Å 2 = 4.73⋅10 3 ÌPà, ν 12 = 0.26, ν 21 = 0.16, G = 1.51⋅10 3 ÌPà, σ d 90 = 4.89 ÌPà⋅cm/fringe, σ d 0 = 2.81 ÌPà⋅cm/fringe, σ d 45 = 3.69 ÌPà⋅cm/fringe; ε d =