Disasters & Drama

When things went very wrong, or very nearly did. 18 stories, a few minutes each.

1. The Great Molasses FloodOn January 15, 1919, a storage tank in Boston's North End collapsed and released 2.3 million gallons of molasses in a wave that reached speeds of…
2. The Woman Who Sold the Eiffel TowerContrary to popular legend, Victor Lustig did not actually sell the Eiffel Tower. He sold the rights to scrap it, which in 1925 seemed like a…
3. The Tunguska EventOn the morning of June 30, 1908, something exploded in the sky above a remote stretch of Siberian forest.
4. Kiruna — The Town That MovedKiruna, Sweden's northernmost city, sits 145 kilometers above the Arctic Circle on top of one of the largest and purest iron ore deposits on Earth.…
5. Tsutomu YamaguchiTsutomu Yamaguchi is the only person officially recognized by the Japanese government as having survived both atomic bombings. He was three…
6. CentraliaThe underground fire beneath Centralia, Pennsylvania, has been burning since 1962. Experts estimate there is enough coal in the seams under the…
7. The London Beer Flood of 1814At around 5:30 in the afternoon on October 17, 1814, a wooden vat at Meux and Company's Horse Shoe Brewery ruptured and released a wave of porter…
8. The Door to HellIn the Karakum Desert of Turkmenistan, about 160 miles north of the capital, there's a crater that has been on fire for over fifty years. It…
9. The Great Maple Syrup HeistQuebec produces about 77 percent of the world's maple syrup, and the industry is tightly controlled by the Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers.
10. The Lake That Turns Animals to StoneIn northern Tanzania, near the Kenyan border, there's a shallow salt lake that preserves dead animals like fossils.
11. The Year Without a SummerIn April 1815, Mount Tambora on the Indonesian island of Sumbawa erupted with a force roughly four times that of Krakatoa.
12. The Woman Who Fell 33,000 FeetOn January 26, 1972, JAT Yugoslav Airlines Flight 367 exploded at 33,330 feet over Czechoslovakia. A bomb planted in the forward cargo hold by…
13. FordlandiaIn 1928, Henry Ford purchased 2.5 million acres of land along the Tapajós River in the Brazilian Amazon and built a town called Fordlandia. His…
14. The Shortest War in HistoryOn August 27, 1896, the British Empire went to war with the Sultanate of Zanzibar. The conflict lasted between 38 and 45 minutes, depending on the…
15. Cher AmiIn October 1918, during the final weeks of World War I, a battalion of the U.S. 77th Infantry Division advanced into the Argonne Forest in…
16. The Night WitchesDuring World War II, the Soviet Union formed three all-female air regiments. The most famous was the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, which the Germans…
17. Nellie BlyIn November 1889, a 25-year-old journalist named Nellie Bly left New York City with a single bag and the goal of traveling around the world faster…
18. The Real Robinson CrusoeIn September 1704, a Scottish sailor named Alexander Selkirk asked to be put ashore on an uninhabited island in the South Pacific.