LHC Explodes!!!

[bascule]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1626728.ece

 

“There was a hell of a bang, the tunnel housing the machine filled with helium and dust and we had to call in the fire brigade to evacuate the place,” he said. “The people working on the test were frightened to death but they were all in a safe place so no-one was hurt.” An investigation by Cern researchers found “fundamental” flaws that caused the explosion, close to the CMS detector, one of the LHC’s most important experiments.

 

Damn...

[Pangloss]

The last bit of the article with the political angle was interesting, regarding the search for the Higgs boson. Kinda hard to imagine Fermilab would do something like that on purpose, considering what this may cost them in the long run, but I'm sure there will be speculation to that effect around the community.

[Sayonara]

Oooh, that's a bit embarrassing.

 

I wonder if Fermilab will be made to pay compensation?

[insane_alien]

i know they were hoping to create mini big bangs but thats just ridiculous

[bascule]

Looks like this bit is what went boom:

 

 

Yikes!

[insane_alien]

the article said it was one of the magnets on the accelerator tunnel not the detector. although, both are pretty big and could blow up if you made them wrong.

[Severian]

To be honest, I think CMS will be rather happy this happened. They are quite a bit behind schedule and this will give them a chance to catch up. CMS's delay may not delay the switch on now.

 

Also, since the explosion was in the tunnel, the work to repair it is decoupled from the work assembling the experiments (the things in the pic bascule showed - that is CMS I think). So it shouldn't delay the switch on much. And Fermilab really need a long time to build luminosity for a Higgs discovery (unless they are very very lucky) so I don't think a few months will give them it.

 

For the official explanation of what happened see:

http://user.web.cern.ch/user/QuickLinks/Announcements/2007/LHCInnerTriplet_1.html

(Its a bit technical though)

[GutZ]

Review of engineering design documentation reveals that the longitudinal force generated by asymmetric loading was not included in the engineering design or identified as an issue in the four design reviews that were carried out.

 

lmao opps.

 

How long have they been in operation for (not full, but test capable)?

[YT2095]

heh, that`s not at All like I excepted a Black Hole to look:rolleyes:

[Severian]

lmao opps.

 

How long have they been in operation for (not full, but test capable)?

 

They had just put them in. This was the first test I think.