DARK MATTER

Tees man’s U-bend-blocker at top lab

RESEARCH at the CERN laboratories into finding the elusive Higgs boson – the fundamental sub-atomic particle that could hold the key to the origin of the universe – was halted yesterday after a man from Middlesbrough blocked the bogs.

Phil Tinker, 52, had been on a day trip to the particle physics establishment outside Geneva when he produced a bowel movement so large that the toilets, and Large Hadron Collider itself, were shut down as a safety precaution.

“I’d flown in on an early flight from Teesside airport, so I’d not had time to go before I left,” Tinker told reporters. “I’d had a couple of chicken parmos the night before, and a couple of pints and a full English at the Wetherspoons the other side of security, so I was proper full.”

cloppa

The 35-stone former glassblower arrived at CERN, the home of the world’s largest particle accelerator mid-morning, and he began to wander around the visitor centre, looking at the exhibitions. But it wasn’t long before he was gripped with the urge to use the toilet.

“There was a fascinating exhibition on the discovery of the so-called Intermediate Vector Bosons which were pivotal in establishing the standard model of particle physics,” said Tinker . “But I’d been baking my parmos and full English since early doors and I could tell the bomb-bay was full and the doors were about to open.”

Tinker rushed to the toilets to do his duty, a task that took nearly half an hour. “It was better out than in, let me tell you,” he said. “After finishing

up the paperwork, I flushed the toilet and prepared to wash my hands.”

But he was in for a surprise.

“It was a massive job and the bugger was going nowhere without a fight,” he said. “I flushed three, four, five times, but it wasn’t shifting. And it was stinking the bogs out, let me tell you.”

herbert

Before long, the cloying stench from Tinker’s movement started to permeate the visitors centre. And it wasn’t long before the foetid smell was noticeable in the accelerator control room too.

“I’ve been looking into the first order phase transition of quarkgluon plasma,” said Quantum Chromodynamics Laboratory head Professor Ernst Jacobssen, in charge of experiments looking at how subatomic particles behave at the interface of states of matter. “I was just analysing some output data from the collider when this choking, acrid smell hit me in the back of the throat.”

“Jesus Christ it was rank,” he added.

Seconds later, the smell set off an alarm in the main control room, triggering an automatic shutdown of the 27km-long collider and the broadcast of an automated warning to evacuate the facility.

“The place was emptied in three minutes,” said Dr Maria Delgardo, who is examining the properties of

CERN GIANT: Phil Tinker’s (inset bottom) outsized movement triggered automatic shutdown at high-tech facility.

antihydrogen – an atom consisting of a positron and an antiproton. “Every experiment was shut down and suddenly 2,500 people are stood kicking their heels in the car park because some bloke from the ’Boro blocks the shitter up.”

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Eventually, a maintenance crew wearing hasmat suits entered the building and managed to clear the affected toilet of the superdense matter, before completely flushing the air and re-ventilating the complex. Two hours after the evacuation, the all-clear signal was given and scientists, staff and visitors were allowed back in.

“It was a bit disappointing, as I only had forty-five minutes before I had to get back for my return flight to Teesside,” said Tinker. “So I had a quick look round the gift shop, bought a pencil and a rubber, and made my way back to the airport shuttle.”

easy peeler

A spokesperson for CERN said that they were sorry for any disruption that was caused by the emergency evacuation, but said that it demonstrated all the safety measures put in place for the safe running of the accelerator were working correctly.

“There was a lot of fear in the early days that a malfunction of the particle accelerator could cause a cataclysmic event,” said CERN’s director of safely Dr Elspeth Crumb. “But if our safety protocols can handle some doyle’s fudge after two chicken parmos and a full English, it can handle anything.”