Speed of the CERN Neutrinos released on 22.9.2011 - Was stated superluminality due to neglecting General Relativity?

Abstract

During the years 2009 to 2011, neutrino beams were fired repeatedly from CERN towards a detector in Italy's Gran Sasso tunnel, some 4 deg south and 7 deg east of CERN, at a distance of 730.5 km, in the shape of short bunches of particles. Their time of flight (2.5 msec) was measured at high accuracy (nsec) with caesium clocks (Reich 2011). Remarkably, the CNGS team found a deficit of 61 nsec compared with propagation at the speed of light, and concluded at superluminal speeds, of order 10$^{-4.6}$. In this communication, I will argue that this is the first experiment to test Einstein's theory for the (weak) gravity field of Earth, with the result that the neutrinos propagated (just) luminally.