Report: A Weasel Shut Down the Large Hadron Collider

Gizmodo ^ | 04/29/2016 | Maddie Stone

[BenLurkin]

The Large Hadron Collider suffered a power outage last night, after a luckless weasel decided to chew on a 66-kilovolt power cable.

It’s not the first time the LHC, a 17-mile superconductor that smashes atoms together at close to the speed of light, has run into trouble because of something small and cute. In 2009, the power went down after a bird dropped a baguette onto a critical electrical system. Although the incident was widely reported and confirmed at the time by sources at the LHC, CERN is apparently now telling folks it may be apocryphal.

“This was a story that was told, but we never knew exactly what happened,” CERN spokesperson Arnaud Marsollier told New Scientist regarding the baguette incident. “We’re in the countryside, you have wild animals.”

[kaehurowing]

Hey, has anyone seen Joe recently?

[goodwithagun]

In his defense, he doesn’t have a single clue what he’s done.

[paintriot]

POP goes the weasel.

[LonePalm]

Here is the culprit.

This is the North American Spork weasel. It is known to post on Free Republic.

"Ceterum censeo 0bama esse delendam."

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

[TChad]

There was no time-traveling pigeon?

What a letdown.

[Shark24]

Wonder if he did that in all the Multiverses or just this one? Seems like all the interesting things happen in our Multiverse. :)

[Telepathic Intruder]

The first computer “bug” was actually a moth that landed on a circuit board of the world’s first computer, the ENIAC, and shorted it out.

[cyclotic]

The same thing happened to my brand new truck. One month in, some rodent ate the headlight wire with soy based insulation.

[Tucker39]

Have any of those geniuses over there ever heard of metal conduit? Imagine, leaving unprotected power cables exposed not just to the elements, but to rodents.......or to vandals. Crap for brains!

[ClearCase_guy]

In the USA this could result in a total and permanent shutdown of CERN due to its devastating effect on local wildlife.

[BenLurkin]

Those time machine mishaps can be quite nasty...

[Larry Lucido]

So that explains the collapsing magnetic field the other day.

[MrEdd]

Got Sporkweasel?

[null and void]

Was it a sporkweasel?

[COBOL2Java]

What was Paul Krugman doing at the Hadron Collider?

[BenLurkin]

[smokingfrog]

Was the weasel responsible for the manetosphere collapse too?

[llevrok]

major medical, boys !!

[DaxtonBrown]

Look! Over there! A weasel!

(as the black hole continues to grow)

They aren’t foolin anybody WHO KNOWS!