Massive Engineering Mistakes

Humans have been building for more than ten thousand years - we're engineering experts and yet every year, tales emerge of construction calamites from all over the world. From the extraordinary to the ridiculous, this series uncovers the epic fails and near misses engineers would rather not talk about. We analyse what went wrong with each building blunder.

In downtown San Francisco, what's causing a skyscraper to sink?

What brought a Pennsylvania railroad bridge to its knees?

Downtown Chicago is in the grip of an engineering emergency.

In Dallas, a shining skyscraper is dazzling its neighbours, but why?

Over a hundred thousand people evacuate their homes, as America's tallest dam struggles to hold back storm waters.

An age-old engineering catastrophe is causing Baltimore's sewers to back up.

Bolts the size of an arm fall from a London skyscraper, but what's causing them to crack?

America's first space station, Skylab, was nearly destroyed on launch, then fell back to Earth.

Thousands gather to watch two apartment blocks get blown to the ground, but one tower refused to fall.