Large Hadron Collider nuclear scientist charged with terror offences

[Bill Mattocks]

Oooh, lovely. Terrorists at the switch of the doomsday machine.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-st...charged-with-terror-offences-115875-21743486/

Large Hadron Collider nuclear scientist charged with terror offences
A physicist who works at a nuclear facility has been charged with terror offences.

A French judge filed preliminary charges against the scientist who works at the Large Hadron Collider, the world's largest atom smasher.

 

[Sukerkin]

James Gillies, of CERN, which operates the collider on the French-Swiss border, said: "There's nothing in there that people can steal and use for terrorist ends."

The fellow has been charged for association with a terrorist group via the Net; there is no indication that he planned any terrorist acts nor, indeed, that any such act at the LHC would do more than cause yet another long delay in the repairs to it.

Gotta love the Mirror, sensationalist by implication is their stock in trade.

 

[MBuzzy]

He was planning to screw with some dials and create a black hole that would swallow the infidels.

 

[Tez3]

Oooh, lovely. Terrorists at the switch of the doomsday machine.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-st...charged-with-terror-offences-115875-21743486/

The scientist was large? thats how it reads lol!

Certain newspapers here will be trying for sensationist stories to save their friends, the MPs from having to read about the on-going, still, stories of the MP's expenses scandal. Letters were sent this week telling the
MPs to cough up and pay back some of the money they had claimed for, so a good terrorist story to scare us all and fall on our knees begging said MPs to help us is a good idea, no?

I understood the collider hadn't actually worked yet.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

I understood the collider hadn't actually worked yet.

Correct. Does that make a difference? Seems to me that terrorists ought to be kept away from such things.

 

[elder999]

Correct. Does that make a difference? Seems to me that terrorists ought to be kept away from such things.

All they could do is break it.....

 

[Ken Morgan]

I’d be worried about some poor shmuck turning 40, having marital problems, having no friends, having his teenagers act like teenagers, deep in debt, going off his meds, losing his tin foil hat and thinking the government is watching him through his computer screen. This is the guy who will snap one day and decide to take some people with him. Homegrown terrorists are the ones we can’t see until its too late.

Hey, anyone see my tinfoil hat around….I put it down somewhere around here…

 

[Xue Sheng]

James Gillies, of CERN, which operates the collider on the French-Swiss border, said: "There's nothing in there that people can steal and use for terrorist ends."
.

OH YEAH!!!! What about sharp pointy things that might be laying around and bits of wire that you can poke people with and ooooo what about paper...paper cuts can REALLY hurt you know

 

[Sukerkin]

:shriek: Terror! I know all too well how bad paper cuts can be.

The real thing to take away from this story is that sometimes even bumbling and draconian security measures do make a 'hit'.

Not to give terrorists (or the Chinese government) any ideas but someone could do far more damage to a country in my line of work than someone working on the Collider.

 

[MBuzzy]

I would think that the biggest threat from terrorists here is that they would sabotage the thing, wasting MORE millions of dollars. OR, the thing has to have a pretty substantial power source....I mean, if you know enough about it and could cause widespread catastrophy, the thing could be used as a weapon, in its own destruction, kind of like going to a nuclear power plant and causing a melt down.

 

[Bruno@MT]

A terrorist could do real damage TO the collider, not WITH the collider.
And that would be bad enough.

 

[Xue Sheng]

What would terrorists gain by messing with the Collider?

A news story perhaps, which is of some importance to terrorist organizations, but beyond that...what?

 

[celtic_crippler]

Correct. Does that make a difference? Seems to me that terrorists ought to be kept away from such things.

You mean like nukes?

Hell, it seems to me most of the world couldn't care less if they blew it up or not. :shrug:

 

[Xue Sheng]

Oooh, lovely. Terrorists at the switch of the doomsday machine.

Wait a minute

The Collider isn't the doomsday machine...

This is

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Wait a minute

The Collider isn't the doomsday machine...

This is

I must respectfully disagree. The doomsday machine was a 1968 Chrysler Imperial that contained NBC 'Network Executives" that came to terminate Star Trek on Saturday Night Live.

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/75/75vstartrek.phtml

They took Spock's ears. Bastiches!

 

[Tez3]

Correct. Does that make a difference? Seems to me that terrorists ought to be kept away from such things.

Well if it doesn't work he can't use it lol!
There's a lot of people in jobs they really shouldn't be not just terrorists!

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Well if it doesn't work he can't use it lol!

Certainly not whilst it is broken, but it's like saying a bank robber can have a shotgun as long as it is unloaded.

My thought would be that a bank robber ought not have a shotgun at all.

And that is not to mention the technology that he would be exposed to working in such an environment, and what use that might have outside of CERN.

There's a lot of people in jobs they really shouldn't be not just terrorists!

But perhaps we could agree that it is still a problem when a terrorist is found to be working in a highly scientific environment with exposure to cutting-edge technology.

 

[elder999]

And that is not to mention the technology that he would be exposed to working in such an environment, and what use that might have outside of CERN..

Magnets, detectors-a bunch of other stuff that he couldn't lift, could obtain elsewhere, and most of which couldn't be particularly destructive if he did.

 

[MBuzzy]

Doesn't the thing need a realtively large power source??

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Magnets, detectors-a bunch of other stuff that he couldn't lift, could obtain elsewhere, and most of which couldn't be particularly destructive if he did.

I must be the only person with any imagination here. If I am a bad person with control over, say, a fork lift, I can think of lots of nasty things I can do with it besides what it was intended for, or even by using it as intended but to ill effect. I could imagine that this collider can be used for purposes other than intended. Likewise, it can be sabotaged, to damage it or to cause collateral damage, one would imagine. And again, one would imagine a rather large amount of technical knowledge surrounds such things. Why it would be "OK" for a terrorist to have it is a bit beyond me. Perhaps it is not useful to terrorists. Or perhaps it is. My thought would be to err on the side on "Hell NO the terrorists cannot run our big machine!"