M.Schaefer/iStock/Getty A weasel wreaked havoc on the LHC.
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According to internal documents, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, a 27-kilometer underground ring used to collide particles at almost the speed of light, is experiencing some issues.
The critter’s damage created a “severe electrical perturbation”, according to the facility’s incident report.
Burnt remains of a furry animal were found near gnawed cable, but scientists haven’t finished analyzing the remnants yet. The Large Hadron Collider suffered a power outage last night, after a luckless weasel chose to chew on a 66-kilovolt power cable.
The 17-mile superconductor smashes protons together at high speeds to study particle physics.
“We had electrical problems, and we are pretty sure this was caused by a small animal, a weasel, probably”, said Arnaud Marsollier – head of press for the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire or CERN) – to NPR.
It’s not the first time that the LHC has suffered at the hands of animals.
In 2009, a bird apparently dropped a piece of bread into the outdoor workings, causing a slight rise in temperature in one of the carefully calibrated segments of the LHC. Repairs are expected in a few days, though the collider might not be fully operational again for a few weeks.
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The fault comes at a time when the LHC was preparing to collect information on the Higgs Boson, a fundamental particle it discovered in 2012.
