What a load of rubbish - The truth is more boring - as was explained on BBC Five Live's Sportsweek programme: 'The fact is planning permission for the roof and the air management system was granted on the basis of an 11 o'clock finish.'

The 11pm curfew is probably down to rostering of key staff who are required for the daily running of such a large event with 40,000 on site each day. Examples that spring to mind are :- - stewards for crowd management - car park attendants - First Aiders (provided by St John's Ambulance for the tournament) - Bus drivers for the park and ride - available time to clean the site overnight before the next days play With the exception of the last example all of these had probably been on duty from the start of the day and are required back the following day at the same time. The "Health and Safety" reasons could be down to :- - these key individuals having a suitable period of rest between shifts - not being able to provide First Aid cover - not being able to provide buses for the Park and Ride because the drivers were out of their hours - the site not being thoroughly cleaned before next days play It is also likely that external organisations, could enforce the 11pm curfew such as the police etc. Its likely that the emergency services would have rostered additional personnel to be on shift during the hours of the tournament and that after 11pm, numbers on duty/shift would be reduced and not sufficient for the large numbers entering the streets of SW19 at a late hour. However, being cynical, its probably down to the licence the AELTC have for the tornament with the local authorities.

We're doomed. Jon

Seemingly they consulted the H&S bod on the night and the response given was "finish it!" (maybe their H&S adviser is a Scot!)

Ron Yes I have. I watched the match on BBC 1 TV on Saturday night. Could not believe my ears and as I was in company I felt the need to depart to the gents so as to avoid any further embarrassment. So it is the BEEB Wimbledon commentary. I'm sure it can be recovered or on pod cast. Jon

I too heard that reference and was initially annoyed. I suspect that the 11PM curfew is related to licensing law which has as one of its elements "public safety". For late night entertainment a license is required, costing £££s and it is quite feasible that AELTC do not posess such a licence. It may therefore have been reasonable to cite "safety" reasons for the 11PM cessation of play.

But why not cite the correct reasons i.e. the AELTC does not not have a licence to sell alcohol after 11pm so we are going to lock down, turn the lights out, cut you loose to roam with any other gansters that might be lurking in Wimbledon, the police have gone to bed, and the volunteer St John Ambulance staff have put overtime in (on their volunteering job) so they are not going to treat you if you get mugged. it is really hard to stay sane in this game! Jon

Having made my point above I would like to suggest a more specific answer to your question. You asked "Anyone hazard a guess as what the risks were and why they (if any) demanded such a precise lock down." I would suggest that it is a planning condition on potential noise (nuisance) pollution arising from the cooling units that have to be used when the roof is closed. The window for such noise pollution defaults to 2300-0700. I can well imagine the local neighbours/councillors wanting some control of the use of the roof to limit any such impact. It may also relate to the noise from large numbers of spectators leaving the area. Unfortunately I cannot access pre-2005 planning documents on line to confirm this but from later correspondence which is searchable it is quite clear that such a time based condition was placed on the planning approval for the roof and/or supporting systems. Simples and of course shows that it is to do with H&S; just not everyday workplace H&S;-) p48

As with a lot of situations where "health & safety" is mis-quoted/blamed, I guess that this one arises because it's so much easier for the AELTC, journalists, etc to use "health & safety" as a quick convenient expression than try to think of another one or bother mentioning the real reasons behind the 11pm finish including the local authority requirement to limit the exposure of local residents to unnecessary noise and disturbance late at night. Even where such requirements aren't imposed, surely it's sensible for any public venue with evening events to try to stick to a reasonable finishing time for various reasons. These include public transport availability, consideration for local residents and, equally important, various categories of people at work. As others have already stated, such workers include first aiders, police officers, TV commentators and of course venue employees who have various tasks to do for some considerable time after spectators have left. In the case of a finish at Wimbledon at or around 11pm, I guess that employees there might hope to leave by midnight. As I’ve always understood the word curfew to mean a ban on people (either everybody or specific categories of people) being on public streets during specific periods of time, usually at night, I was intrigued by jfw’s reference to ‘curfew’ at #4. From a bit of internet delving, it seems that journalists have misappropriated the word as a reference to the 11pm latest finish time at Wimbledon. If a true curfew existed there, surely the AELTC would need to end evening matches somewhat earlier than 11pm! Therefore, in my view the media reference to Wimbledon is yet another example of an increasingly sloppy use of English by journalists. Decide for yourselves whether this view is pedantic or a championing of good English! p.s. Staff at venues where veteran comedian Ken Dodd has evening performances usually warn aspiring audience members that he is prone to continue well into the early morning hours. There's a story that at one theatre the manager walked onto the stage around 2am to tell Ken that he was going home for some much needed sleep, and therefore handed Ken some keys telling him to lock up after he did decide to finish! :-)