LHC Shut Down By Transformer Malfunction 293
Ortega-Starfire writes "A 30-ton transformer in the Large Hadron Collider malfunctioned, requiring complete replacement on the day the LHC came online. No one at CERN reported any problems, and they only released this data once the Associated Press sent people to investigate rumors of problems. I guess it's hard to just sweep a 30-ton transformer breaking under the rug."
Why the tone in the summary? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a big, complicated machine - shit breaks. It gets fixed. I wouldn't worry about it unless you're waiting for beam time.
I don't really think CERN owe the media any favors (Score:5, Insightful)
Whilst I'm sure that is beneficial for CERN in the context that most people will be completely unaware on the day that full speed collisions are truly started, I do not for one moment think the media had that intention. A publicised failure would only serve to increase people's prejudice.
Not Everyone Has That Degree (Score:3, Insightful)
Well that's great that you have that degree, but not everyone does. To people who aren't too familiar with that area of study or work, saying "30 tons" paints a much better picture in the reader's minds.
Not News and News (Score:5, Insightful)
If you read TFA, you discover that it, but not the provided summary on /., says it was news to nobody in the field that something broke. What's not said here, but said in TFA and far more worthy of mention, is that they replaced it and were running again the next day, well before AP even inquired. Falling prey to the cheap journalistic gimmick of awfulism, are we?
Re:Why the tone in the summary? (Score:3, Insightful)
You've clearly never participated in any big launch of a technology. Heck, if software project first demos went as well as the LHC's, developers would be ecstasic.
Re:Not News and News (Score:2, Insightful)
But without sensationalism and misrepresentation, what would we have to wring our hands over???
You want some really interesting discussion, hunt down gorilla199's youtube account. "Satan's stargate"... now THAT's entertainm...I mean information. ROFL...
Re:morethanmeetstheeye (Score:5, Insightful)
Slashdot- your source for yellow (tech) journalism (Score:4, Insightful)
this is not a major failure
there is no sinister cover-up
no one was ever in any danger
Thanks for some more fear-mongering doomsday garbage "news" Slashdot. The purpose of editors, at least for non-tabloid news sources, is to filter factually inaccurate and inflammatory nonsense, not seek it out.
Re:I have a degree in electrical engineering... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a fairly standard measurement for mass, though. Transformers have mass, so it's perfectly applicable, especially when you are trying to underscore the massiveness of the piece of equipment in question, rather than its functional capability. If the person writing the article/summary wanted to underscore the cost of the unit, he might have measured it in US dollars. That's what journalists do: describe things in terms their readers might understand or care about. And most of their readers aren't pedantic electrical engineers.
Re:Why the tone in the summary? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this the controversial machine that may or may not destroy the planet itself?
Goddammit NO. It's the machine that will not destroy the planet, but some controversial people have done a damn good job of spreading rumors that it will. The point of the LHC is to re-create events that occur everywhere in the universe all the time, including here on earth. It's just not practical to put 50' diameter detectors hanging in the upper atmosphere and wait for a particle collision to happen inside of one.
Re:Transformers... (Score:5, Insightful)
There, fixed that for you. Also, turn in your geek badge.
Fixed.
Re:Why the tone in the summary? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the problem is that everyone who actually understands this big complicated machine also understands they break, especially when first built.
This are one of a kind structures. Everyone who matters in the project or in the community that really knows how it works and what it does has probably dealt with previous ones ... which breaking or needing major changes early on isn't a shocker for them.
To the guys who are working on it, it was probably just a question of what broke, not if it broke. We're not talking about creating a piston engine, which we've been doing for a hundred years, we're talking about new technology custom built for the project for the most part. The transformer probably wasn't, but they break too. I have a coworker whos husband worked for a large power company, helping to install substations, it wasn't suprising to him that it broke, appearently for large scale transformers its still hit or miss when they first start being used.
If no one involved in the project is really 'shocked' that it broke, maybe it the thought that it should be a media frenzy never crossed their minds?
Re:What, did Fermilab make the transformer too? (Score:2, Insightful)
They really can't be called rivals though. Fermilab cannot replicate the experiments that LHC can perform and Fermilab probably cannot be upgraded to do so on a feasible budget. When Fermilab became the most powerful accelerator in the world (and it did find new quarks and what not because of it) it did not put CERN out of business and LHC is not going to do that to Fermilab (our own government can do that on their own).
Re:Why the tone in the summary? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yay, scientists have facts, but the rest of people will have questions.
Actually it's the other way round.
Re:Not Everyone Has That Degree (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I have a degree in electrical engineering... (Score:1, Insightful)
...and I didn't realize the standard measurement for transformers had been changed to tons. Must be a European measurement?
I think kVA or MVA would be a better statistic.
when it stops working thats the only measurement useful
Re:Not the end of the world... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why the tone in the summary? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's just not practical to put 50' diameter detectors hanging in the upper atmosphere and wait for a particle collision to happen inside of one.
heh, b/c building a 27km underground tunnel is generally considered "practical".
Note that I am in very much favor of these highly experimental projects but I don't really think of them as practical.
Anthropic Principle (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:morethanmeetstheeye (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean this as no insult to digg, but the comments on the articles (and most of the articles themselves) are absolute shit. Most of the people commenting are - by their own admission - highschoolers and young college kids. With Slashdot, at least there's some pretense of being accurate and factual in the comments - users who troll or make ill-informed posts are usually modded down or corrected by other users.
In summary, I submit to you a summary of the current digg RSS feed as evidence of article and community quality on digg -
The above is but a small sample of the typical digg feed. Oddly, there aren't any "Marijuana will cure everything and it's 'big pharma' keeping it illegal maaaaaan" articles in the feed, but I'm sure those will trickle in as the day goes on.
:-)
Seriously. Digg is fucking retarded. Hang out there for a week and tell me Slashdot has approached that level of stupidity or redundancy.
No offense to digg or the OP, BTW