
Prof Brian Cox secured an exclusive interview for Science, Reason and Critical thinking with the Director of CERN, Professor Nigel Tufnel:

Prof. Tufnel: The LHS goes to 99.9999991% of the speed of light. Look, right across the board, 3.5 TeV, 3.5 TeV, 3.5 Tev and...
Prof. Cox: Oh, I see. And most particle accelerators go up to 99.995% of the speed of light?
Prof. Tufnel: Exactly.
Prof. Cox: Does that mean it's faster? Is it any faster?
Prof. Tufnel: Well, it's 0.0049991% faster, isn't it? It's not 99.995%. You see, most particle accelerators, you know, will be firing particles at 99.995% of the speed of light. You're on 99.995% here, all the way up, all the way up, all the way up, you're on 99.995 on your accelerator. Where can you go from there? Where?
Prof. Cox: I don't know.
Prof. Tufnel: Nowhere. Exactly. What we do is, if we need that extra push over the cliff, you know what we do?
Prof. Cox: Put it up to 99.9999991% of the speed of light.
Prof. Tufnel: 99.9999991%. Exactly. 0.0049991% faster.
Prof. Cox: Why don't you just make it accelerate the particles to the speed of light?
Prof. Tufnel: [pause] The LHC goes to 99.9999991%.