It was an unusual situation: for the first time, both machines were down at the same time.

On March 20, we had to  close down Linac Green due to beam symmetry problems.

Then, on March 21, Linac Blue crashed with a short in the high voltage pulse cable running from the modulator to the klystron.

Now both machines were down, waiting for parts: an ion chamber and a pulse cable (they had been ordered immediately).

The first information was this: The ion chamber was on stock in the Netherlands. But the chamber design had been changed from copper to steel, and the new chamber (being a little thicker) needed new screws. Unfortunately, the screws were not on stock, and had to be ordered in Las Vegas. The cable should arrive by Thursday.

Thursday morning, everybody came to work knowing that there was not much to do. Both Linacs were down, but at least ARIA was running fine!

The first update came at noon: according to TNT tracking, the cable should have arrived at the airport. But not the plane. At least, not in Vienna. Very confusing. It was decided to take out the cable from Linac Green and put it in on Linac Blue. Halfway done, the new cable arrived. So Linac Blue could be fixed quickly.

 

(By the way: one week later, we were still waiting for the screws. The were sent to Finland instead of Austria.)