Thermal shielding breakthrough
The first vacuum vessel sector for ITER was delivered to ITER in August 2020 after it was taken off the assembly line in April 2020. The final sector sailed on August 24, 2024, and it went through the ITER gates after circumnavigating the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa and continuing north to the Strait of Gibraltar and into the Mediterranean.
Work started on the first of the four enormous components in October 2012. Two six-meter steel slabs that were 60 millimeters thick were shaped using high-pressure water jet cutting.