Big Ben will bong again to see in the new year

The bell will be struck 12 times as it hits midnight on New Year’s Eve, despite other celebrations in the capital being cancelled.

It will be the first time in nearly four years that the clock face of Elizabeth Tower will be on show for the event, following years of restoration.

And it will be the last time a temporary mechanism will be used to sound the bell.

Restoration of the tower and its famous clock began in 2017, meaning the exterior was covered in scaffolding and the bell itself was silenced.

However, it gave Parliament the opportunity to carry out its biggest repair and conservation project in the building’s 160-year history.

The clock was designed by Edmund Beckett Denison and installed by Edward John Dent in 1859.

Its mechanism, which weighs eleven-and-a-half tonnes, was removed and taken to clock specialists the Cumbria Clock Company in the Lake District, where more than 1,000 separate parts were cleaned and repaired.

The pieces have now been returned to Westminster and are being reinstalled over the coming months.

But the clock face - restored to its original colours - is now on show, and from spring next year, Big Ben and the four quarter bells will once again play the “Westminster Quarters” melody and bong on the hour throughout the day.

Some good news at last … :041:

:bell:

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makes no difference to me I can’t hear it from Wales :roll_eyes:

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A lucky escape then WB, but thinking about all the cost of renovations, it’s about time the bells rang our right across Westminster.

Well, I’m thrilled, I love that old clock, it spells London and home and New Year to me and I never hear the bongs without feeling excited. I’m almost in tears!

Many the time I’ve stood in Trafalgare Square or down by the river waiting for the bongs and getting hugged and singing Auld Lang Syne with total strangers

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Not for me for two reasons:-

  1. I do not celebrate New Year on January 1st

and

  1. I cannot stand the sound of big ben - to the extent I even turn the radio off when it is due to chime. Gives me the shudders!

I went to Trafalgar Square once for the new year when I was in my very early 20’s. Was pickpocketed, :icon_sad: :icon_sad: neve wanted to do it again.

What a shame, it is a bit of a jungle out there

Yay, good news! It’s nice to see some things are going right.

Except for Sadiq Khan wanting to ban the New Year celebrations in Trafalgar Square.

Why is that?It seems quite harmless to me.

‘Interesting’ headline… :069:

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I am joining Big Ben and getting my bong out to celebrate the new year.

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The mind bogles !

I cannot explain it, Smiffy, always been the same.

It’s not from the past.British rule in Ireland :slight_smile:

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It was the bells that made me deaf!
Hunchback

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No - no connection that I am aware of.

It’s as big a mystery as your hatred of the humble sprout.

Foxy, U wanna show wot made yer Blind :icon_wink:

No mystery there - what ever you do with them they taste foul !