00:00When you think about the most photographed spots in the world, this would have to be one of them, London's Big Ben.
00:10Everyone snaps it from street level, but what's it like inside?
00:15We've been invited up for a look.
00:17My tour guide is clockmaker Andrew Strangeway.
00:20First stop, the clock mechanism, which has been here for 166 years.
00:25What's it like working here every day?
00:27It's fantastic. It's a brilliant job.
00:30It's a big responsibility working with this clock because everybody knows it.
00:35I mean, you see the tourists out there coming to see it and everybody notices if there's a problem with it.
00:40And so we have to keep it running absolutely tip-top and on time.
00:44This Wednesday, New Year's Eve, is probably the most important night of the year up here.
00:49Everyone is looking to this clock, to Big Ben, to strike midnight and let us know when New Year's has started.
00:56Because those fireworks are timed to go off with the strike of Big Ben, so we have to be on time.
01:05Oh wow.
01:06Right, so here we are in the east dial.
01:10So we're facing out east.
01:12The dial itself is just over seven metres in diameter.
01:15You could drive a double-decker bus through there.
01:18Please don't.
01:22But we're saving the best part of this iconic landmark till last.
01:26This is Big Ben.
01:27This is Big Ben.
01:28This is Big Ben.
01:29This is the bell.
01:30So this, strictly speaking, is what Big Ben refers to.
01:34Yeah.
01:35So we have one very large bell, thirteen and a half tonnes.
01:38And then around the outside, we have the four quarter bells.
01:42They range between five tonnes and one tonne, and they're what play the tune every quarter of an hour.
01:47These bells deliver the sound of London, don't they?
01:58Absolutely, yes.
01:59You know, you hear it in the radio, you hear it in films.
02:02One tone of Big Ben, you know that that is, that's Big Ben.
02:06It's the heart of London.
02:07What's it like up here on New Year's Eve?
02:09We do have a fantastic view of the fireworks when they go off.
02:12Once we've done our bit, once the clock has struck, we can watch those fireworks,
02:18and they are just the other side of the river, and so we do get a rather good view of those.
02:22Best view in the house?
02:23Best view in the house, yeah, absolutely.
02:25How loud does it get up here?
02:27So it reaches somewhere in the region of 110, 115 decibels when Big Ben strikes,
02:33so ear defenders are a must.
02:35So we're coming up towards the hour.
02:37Let's puff them on.
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