LHC ‘Big Bang Machine’ Switch-on Next Week at CERN in Switzerland

Let’s hope the world won’t end and there will still be a need for Travel Insurance after the so-called Big Bang Machine is turned on! Those who enjoyed The Da Vinci Code might also have enjoyed Dan Brown’s prequel Angels and Demons and been introduced to CERN’s fascinating experiment to re-create the moment after the big bang. The book was a good read, so let’s hope the film Angels and Demons doesn’t disappoint. We will once again see Tom Hanks as Dr. Langdon and the film also stars Ewan McGregor. The U.S. release date is May 2009 so let’s hope we are all still here to watch it when it reaches the UK!  

Although this amazing and gigantic machine will be switched on next Wednesday it seems nothing significant is expected to happen for about a month - when scientists will take photos of the particles colliding and hope to get some answers.  Critics fear that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) could produce unforeseen results, such as creating a black hole which will gobble up the Earth or turn us all into strangelets and goop.  It’s all a bit sci-fi. 

CERN which is actually the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, has spent more than 14 years on the project and involved something like10,000 scientists from dozens of countries. The final bill will be several times above budget at about 6.2bn euros.  The accelerator lies buried in a 27 km long tunnel, at depths of up to 175 m below ground beneath the Alps on the French-Swiss border. The magnets used are said to be capable of creating a magnetic field 100,000 times more powerful than that of the Earth. 

The engineering, physics and science involved is mind-boggling to the average person. Similar experiments have been going on for years close to Chicago and nothing bad has happened (that we are aware of) but the LHC at CERN is about seven times more powerful. What would Einstein say?  Would he be excited or maybe turn in his grave and do some thought-colliding with the scientists?  So… Should we be scared?  Claims that a black hole could be created are debunked by many boffins, including British physicist Stephen Hawking.

It’s doubtful that any Travel Insurance policy will cover negative effects produced by the machine if we end up floating about in the galaxy!

This entry was posted on Friday, September 5th, 2008 at 9:56 am and is filed under Travel Insurance News, Travel News .

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