Here’s one April fool’s joke that had this reporter breathlessly trying to win space in Nature’s forthcoming print issue and scrambling for the phone numbers of particle physicists. The particle theory blog Resonaances reports that management of Europe particle physics’ lab, at CERN, in Geneva has decided to shut down one of the two experiments ATLAS and CMS at the Large Hadron Collider in September 2011, with 3000 layoffs. For those US-side who were disappointed to see the Tevatron, at Fermilab in Illinois, slated for shutdown this year because of tight budgets, the satire will be to the point. It’s also very plausibly done, right down to the broken link that points to a CERN-only sign-in portal and an official explanation that skates over the interexperimental rivalries. Only the lawsuit, fist fight in the Italian Alps, and the ridiculous comments at the end give it away.

Image Credit: Maximilien Brice / CERN