CERN recently lowered the heaviest piece of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) particle detector into the experiment’s cavern, 100m underground. The experiment is scheduled for ‘lift off’ on November 26 2007.
Using a huge gantry crane, custom-built by the Vorspann System Losinger Group, the pre-assembled central piece, containing the magnet and weighing as much as five jumbo jets (1,920t), was gently lowered into place. The entire process took about 10 hours to complete.
A total of 43 manufacturers from Europe alone have supplied lifting gear to CERN, which is located astride the Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, not far from the foothills of the Alps (about an hour by car in fact).
Put simply, CERN aims to recreate the conditions just after the Big Bang to understand why the universe is like it is today. Over a thousand dipole magnets guide the particles around the 27km ring. Several hundred quadrupole magnets focus the particle beams, squeezing them so that more particles collide when the beams cross.
Ingo Ruehl oversees the transport and materials handling team at CERN Ingo Ruehl oversees the transport and materials handling team at CERN
