Comments on the 2001 run of the EXPLORER/NAUTILUS gravitational wave experiment

The recently published analysis of the coincidences between the EXPLORER and NAUTILUS gravitational wave detectors in the year 2001 (Astone P et al 2002 Class. Quantum Grav. 19 5449) has drawn some criticism, reported at this workshop. We do not hold with these objections, even if we agree that no claim can be made with our data. The paper we published reports data of unprecedented quality and sets a new procedure for the coincidence search, which can be repeated by us and by other groups in order to search for the signature of possible signals. As for the reported coincidence excess, we remark that it is not destined to remain an intriguing observation for long: it will be confirmed or denied soon by interferometers and bars operating at their expected sensitivity.