Disasters of the Century

On October 23rd, 1958 a "bump" rocked the #2 mine at the Cumberland Pit. Those at home were just finishing up dinner or settling down in front of the TV when they felt the earth shake. The 1958 bump buried 174 men 13,000 feet underground. Off-duty miners raced to the site to help dig out their colleagues and worked for days without sleep until the last man had been brought to the surface.

On July 6, 1944, the Ringling Bros. Circus came to Hartford, Connecticut. During the afternoon show the main tent, packed with children and women, began to burn. The canvas tent, waterproofed with paraffin and kerosene, went up in a rush of flame. The performers, warned by the orchestra, escaped in time, but 168 of the hundreds of circus goers died in the ensuing inferno.

The Queen Mary was one of the most famous ocean liners of its time. On October 2, 1942, as she rounded the coast of Ireland, 6 destroyers and the HMS Curacoa joined her as an escort. The zigzag pattern of the destroyers caused heavy wakes and forced all 8 ships to make constant course corrections. These corrections, and the superior speed of the Queen Mary, proved disastrous.

Cyclone Tracy came ashore Darwin, Australia on Christmas Eve 1974, damaging or destroying 90% of Darwin's buildings. Storm sustained maximum winds were 148 mph gusting to 187 mph; every tree in Darwin was stripped of its foliage. Some residents took precautions, but many did not. This is the story of the devastation left behind by this powerful natural disaster.

Mt. Taal is an ancient volcano in the Philippines that has erupted every decade or so for hundreds of years. Rising from the lake in the crater of an even older volcano, Taal is as picturesque as it is deadly. On September 28, 1965, Mt. Taal erupted, launching a cloud of steam over 10 miles into the air and sending fiery rocks hissing into the surrounding lake.

Swiss Air 111 heavy is declaring Pan Pan Pan. We have smoke in the cockpit." These strange words (pan pan pan means urgent message) from pilot Urs Zimmerman to Ground Control signalled the start of one of the worst air disasters in Canadian history.