On the evening of Friday, 11 April, CERN will participate in the fifth edition of “La nuit est belle !” . The aim of this initiative is to make turning off or reducing the intensity of public lighting in the middle of the night commonplace.

The theme of the fifth edition is “The culture… of the night.” The founding and organising partners chose this due to the power of culture to raise awareness and change practices.

CERN will join this initiative by switching off the lights all evening and night, of the Globe, the Science Gateway Portal, Gate E, the roads and car parks on the Meyrin and Prévessin sites, and the SPS and LHC sites, except where lighting is required for safety reasons.

If you are working at CERN, you can contribute by switching off your computers, monitors and lights when you go home. Please remember that switching off computers and lights is good practice in general to save energy and favour biodiversity at night, read more at https://hse.cern/content/energy-management.

During the evening and over the weekend, many activities will be organised in the local area.Visit https://lanuitestbelle.org for more information and to register for activities. You can also follow the event live on social media via the hashtag #lanuitestbelle.

Cyclists and pedestrians – make sure that you can be seen in the dark! Car-drivers – stay alert!

HSE recommends that you wear light-coloured clothing, preferably with reflectors, if you are out when it is dark. 

• People wearing dark clothes will be seen by a car from a distance of about 25 metres
• People wearing light-coloured clothes will be seen from a distance of about 40 metres
• People wearing reflectors will be seen from a distance of about 125 metres