On April 6, 2009, at 03:32 a.m. local time, a strong earthquake (Ml = 5.8; Mw = 6.2) struck the town of L’Aquila and its surroundings. As is well known, the earthquake had dramatic consequences: more than 300 victims, thousands injured, and countless left homeless.
Despite being located close to the most heavily affected areas, fortunately neither the personnel nor the equipment of the Gran Sasso Laboratory were damaged by the seismic events. All ongoing experiments continue to operate smoothly, and the external buildings remain essentially untouched.
Regarding our experiment, its structures were designed and built to the highest safety standards, capable of withstanding even the most powerful earthquakes that could be generated by local faults—far stronger than the largest in the current seismic sequence. As expected, they have suffered no damage.
Nonetheless, we were concerned about potential damage to the more delicate, non-structural inner parts of the detector. Yet everything appears to be intact and unaffected, and we plan to resume normal operations as soon as possible.
