Beam impact tests of a prototype target for the beam dump facility at CERN: Experimental setup and preliminary analysis of the online results

The beam dump facility (BDF) is a project for a new facility at CERN dedicated to high intensity beam dump and fixed target experiments. Currently in its design phase, the first aim of the facility is to search for light dark matter and hidden sector models with the Search for Hidden Particles (SHiP) experiment. At the core of the facility sits a dense target/dump, whose function is to absorb safely the $400\text{ }\text{...