Since 1978 the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing, the BAM, has checked the safety of transport casks for nuclear waste with drop tests. A cask falls nine meters onto an unyielding foundation. It falls one meter onto a steel punch aimed at its most sensitive part. Then it burns for half an hour in a fire of 800 degrees. The cask must stay safe in a serious accident.
The institute goes back to 1871, when Prussia founded a royal laboratory for mechanical testing.