Big Ben Silenced for Big Makeover

LONDON, Aug. 11, 2007 — -- Big Ben, one of Britain's best known and best loved landmarks, has lost its voice.

For almost 150 years, the monumental clock tower next to the Houses of Parliament in London has chimed every hour on the hour with a deep, low, distinctive "bong" that is the signature sound of Britain's capital city.

But today, Big Ben fell silent. For the next six weeks, the huge cogs and wheels inside the tower will be overhauled. And the biggest bell -- that is "Big Ben" itself -- will have its main bearings replaced for the first time in its long and celebrated life. It'll still be seen, but not heard.

As the keeper of Big Ben, Mike McCann is a very fit man. He climbs 292 steps up into the clock chamber three times a week. Changing the bearings on a bell that weighs 13 tons is a real challenge, he said.

"The bearings haven't been replaced since the clock was built -- that was 148 years ago," said McCann. "It's quite a serious undertaking."

The tourists who flocked to see Big Ben this weekend didn't seem to notice the difference. Many were more interested in photographing the slight tilt it makes to the northwest -- about 8 inches at the clock face -- because of changing ground conditions since its construction in 1859.

"It's an icon, that's the most important thing," said Elizabeth Hackman from Williamsburg, Va. "You don't have to hear it chime. It just looks so fantastic."

Big Ben is also having a facial -- four facials, in fact, because Big Ben is the second-largest four-faced clock in the world. (The largest is the Allen-Bradley Clock Tower in Milwaukee).

This morning, a SWAT team descended its south face to start cleaning more than 300 individual panes of glass, and the clock's giant hands. The minute hand alone is 14 feet long.

Big Ben not only chimes on the hour. It chimes every quarter hour, too. A decade ago, a British musicologist had the nerve to say that the quarter-hour chimes were flat, and that, altogether, Big Ben was out of tune.

Big Ben survived that slur, just as it survived the German bombing blitz on London in World War II. It also survived countless attacks in Hollywood movies, including one from Mars, when it was blown to smithereens.

There's every reason to think it will make it through this latest rite of passage. And that it will soon be ringing out the hours again in that familiar, haunting sound that's known as "the heartbeat of the nation."