Under a thick blanket of snow
9 Feb 2015
The ITER site woke last Wednesday 4 February under a thick blanket of snow. Although not as spectacular as the "white mess" of 7 January 2009, when hundreds of motorists were stranded on the thruways around Aix and Marseille, the heavy snowfall caused some serious disturbance in the region and on the ITER worksite.
Preventive salting operations began on Tuesday evening in and around the ITER worksite. Snow clearing equipment was operational as early as 4:00 a.m. the following morning, enabling work to resume at around 1:30 pm on oth the Site Service Building and Assembly Hall worksites. There was no activity on the Tokamak Complex basemat, however, as conditions were considered too slippery.
By chance we are in Provence and—if snowfall is sometimes spectacular—the white cover usually melts away quickly, leaving just enough time for inspired ITER staff to shoot some nice photographs.