Mystery as Big Ben falls Silent for an Hour
The chimes of Big Ben were silenced for over an hour on Friday night but the cause remains a mystery, an engineer said today.
The Palace of Westminster's 147-year-old clock, considered to be one of the most reliable in the world, stopped at 10.07pm.
The minute hand started to move again slowly but stalled a second time at 10.20pm where it is reported to have remained for 90 minutes before the hands were reset.
It was thought the hot weather may have been to blame. Temperatures in London reached a high of 31.8C (90F) yesterday and forecasters declared it the hottest May day since 1953.
But an engineer at the palace said the cause was unclear. He said: "We've been told there was a minor glitch but then it was started up again."
The clock is renowned for its accuracy and even survived a dozen attacks by Luftwaffe bombers during the Second World War, continuing to mark the time within one and a half seconds of GMT.
It has, however been late on occasion. In 1962 snow accumulation caused the clock to ring in the new year ten minutes late and in 1976 the clock stopped when a piece of its machinery broke.
It also ground to a halt on April 30, 1997, just 24 hours before the general election and once more three weeks later.
Big Ben is the name of the clock's 13-tonne bell, which was named after Sir Benjamin Hall, the British Commissioner of Works at the time of the clock's construction. The official name for the Gothic tower in which Big Ben nestles is St Stephen's Tower. Standing 100 metres (315ft) tall it was completed in 1858, after an 1834 fire destroyed most of the Palace of Westminster.
