The Hunan Provincial Museum, which is famous for a well-preserved female corpse with a history of more than 2,200 years, has been closed in Changsha, capital of the central China province.
Chen Jianming, head of the museum, said they made the decision to close the museum for a period of time mainly in order to protect the collections from being damaged by the high-humidity air. This is for the first time the museum has been closed to public since its founding.
Chen said that the province is entering its rainy season and the central air-conditioning system of the museum is already running at its highest capacity to keep the air clean to ensure visitors' health.
This has caused much moisture and the humidity inside the museum has reached 80 percent, far greater than the minimum level needed to protect the collections.
Although the museum has taken measures to deal with this, such as using chemical and electric dehumidifiers, the result has not been satisfactory.
"If there are no visitors, the central air-conditioning system won't have to work at its peak force and thus it will produce much less moisture," said Chen.
Meanwhile, due to the severe acute respiratory syndrome situation in the province, the number of visitors has dropped greatly, with only eight visitors on Wednesday.
The museum will reopen when the air temperature rises and the humidity drops to a safe degree, according to Chen.
(Xinhua News Agency May 10, 2003)
