15 Places Where The Worst Engineering Disasters Of All Time Took Place

The modern day infrastructure is the result of some really wonderful engineering showcased by engineers of the modern world. We have been touching new heights in terms of technology advancement and constantly coming up with inventions which are making our lives comfortable. This advancement is making even those events possible which appeared to be impossible at one point of time in the past.

However, we should not forget that the engineers are also humans and they can also make mistakes. The only difference is that the mistakes made by them can be very harmful for mankind and we are going to tell you about 15 such mistakes which can be, in fact, called disasters.

1Quebec Bridge

Quebec Bridge, which is also called Pont de Québec in French, is the world’s longest ever cantilever bridge. It may have been listed in the National Historic Site of Canada in 1995 but it has a very dark past. The project which took more than 30 years to complete has failed two times and took lives of 88 people. It was on 29th August 1907 that it collapsed for the first time and for the second time, it collapsed on 11th September 1916. $22 million was the total cost of damage.

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2The Bhopal gas tragedy

The Bhopal gas tragedy or the Bhopal disaster took place on the night of 2-3 December 1984 at Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) pesticide plant in Bhopal, in the state of Madhya Pradesh, India. Due to this gas leak incident, more than 500,000 people came in contact of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas which is highly toxic and harmful. The reason for the disaster is said to be poor maintenance of MIC tank and it is said that around 8,000 people lost their lives just in two weeks after the leakage while 8,000 individuals have lost their lives since then due to gas related diseases. The effects of the unfortunate incident are still visible on the present generation.

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3Titanic

Huge claims were made regarding RMS Titanic even before it set for its first journey. The quote “practically unsinkable” was used for this grand liner which struck an iceberg on 14th April 1912 during the journey and this collision became the reason of its sinking. 1514 passenger lost their lives while 705 were lucky enough to be rescued by Carpathia. After investigations, it was found that there were material failures and many design faults in the ship.

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4The Hindenburg airship disaster

This German LZ-129 Hindenburg airship disaster brought an end to the airship travel as it was the most technologically advanced airship ever built. It was also the largest commercial airship which was very huge and its size was three times of Boeing 747. The airship which had a top speed of 84 mph burnt into smoke on 6th May 1937 in the sky over the American city of New Jersey. It fell on the ground and took a minute to burn completely. 62 passengers survived as they jumped from dozens of feet while the airship was falling but 36 casualties still took place. The reason for the accident is said to be hydrogen gas leak which becomes a highly inflammable mixture after mixing with oxygen.

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5The Tacoma Bridge collapse

Built in the 1930s in Washington, USA, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge had a total length of 1810 meters. It was the first suspension bridge of the state and the third longest of the world at that time. It was opened for public on 1st July 1940, and some issues were there from the very beginning but they were not given importance and ignored. On 7th Nov 1940, the bridge oscillated a lot due to heavy winds of 40 mph and collapsed. After the investigation, it was found that the bridge was defenseless against the vibrations generated by winds and that was the reason of its collapse.

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