Big Ben is more than just a landmark on the banks of the River Thames in London, it has been a testament to the glory of the British Empire since the Queen of Podoria ascended the throne in 1837.
In fact, in 2012, it has been renamed "Elizabeth Tower", but because it is 97 meters high and heavy, it is called "Big Ben" by the image of the Chinese people, and it is too lazy to change it when it is used to the title, and even many tour guides continue to introduce it.
In 1857, the bell tower cracked and grew larger, and it had to be rebuilt after 1859, the diameter of the bell plate reached 7 meters, and the total weight of the bell was 13.5 tons, costing a total of 270 million pounds. The US economic crisis in the same year also lost 300 million pounds... Britain in that era was indeed rich!
Although extremely expensive, Big Ben has had several problems. For example, a sudden heavy snow in 1962, a sharp thermal expansion and contraction caused it to be "late" for ten minutes; in 1976 and 1997 it was shut down twice because of part failure, and in 2005 it was suspended for an hour for no reason...
On Big Ben's 150th birthday in 2009, Parliament Square was surrounded by hundreds of thousands of Britons, frantically celebrating this British holiday, and even simulating the title of Santa Claus, affectionately calling it "Old Man Zhong".
In order to better maintain the "bell old man", the British parliament decided to stop the operation of Big Ben at noon on August 21, and temporarily replace it with a million pound electric motor core, and in the following four years, the four-sided hour hand of the bell tower will be dismantled one by one, and the internal parts will be completely disassembled and replaced or cleaned.
Big Ben's "butler" Jaggers said: At noon on the 21st, the last bell will ring in Parliament Square, and it will not ring again until 2021. Tourists may be a little disappointed, ringing every 15 minutes, chimes the hourly Big Ben, and can only welcome visitors with the bell after four years.
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