Europeana culture web site crashes at launch

The Europeana web site received around 10 million hits an hour

A two-year digital library project funded by the European Commission has run into difficulties hours after its online launch, and may not be back up until mid-December.

The Europeana library will offer around two million digitised books, films, paintings, newspapers and sound recordings from Europe's greatest collections.

But the web site buckled after receiving around 10 million hits an hour. "We are doing our utmost to reopen Europeana in a more robust version as soon as possible," says an announcement on the web site.

A preview of the library can be seen on the Europeana Project Development Site, although only in English. Europeana will offer a multilingual interface when fully up and running.