The collapse of the walkways in a Kansas City Hotel, an LNG explosion in Ohio, the fatal effects of asbestos, the failure of the Yangtze River levees and the resulting floods, and a sinkhole near San Francisco all illustrate the need for better engineering practices.
A look at several disasters caused at least in part by failures in engineering. Includes the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Watch the amazing "Gallopin' Gertie" November 7, 1940 video clip. 1940 Tacoma Narrows Bridge Slender, elegant and graceful, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge stretched like a steel ribbon across Puget Sound in 1940. The third longest suspension span in the world opened on July 1st. Only four months later, the great span's short life ended in disaster. "Galloping Gertie," collapsed in a windstorm on November 7,1940. The bridge became famous as "the most dramatic failure in bridge engineering history." Now, it's also "one of the world's largest man-made reefs." The sunken remains of Galloping Gertie were placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992 to protect her from salvagers. A dramatic tale of failure and success The story of the failure of the 1940 Narrows Bridge and the success of the Current Narrows Bridge is a great American saga. When Galloping Gertie splashed into Puget Sound, it created ripple effects across the nation and around the world. The event changed forever how engineers design suspension bridges. Gertie's failure led to the safer suspension spans we use today.
A look at nuclear weapons development, the Cold War, and what present nuclear weapons exist.
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Great New England Air Show: SHOCKWAVE DISASTER 9/7/2008
From the Westover Air Force Base in Chicopee, MA, comes this video shot with two XDCam EX. This is a shock video of the "Shockwave" truck, driven by Kent Shockley and designed by his dad, Les Shockley, on it's (unexpectedly) final run. Something went wrong while the truck was at-speed, causing it to veer to the right and do a series of rolls. Footage was taken from two cameras and there is a slow motion replay near the end, showing what happened in more detail. The driver miraculously escaped uninjured, thanks to the great safety engineering that went into the cab of the truck. HD version at: http://exposureroom.com/shock NEW: Crash Detail Enlarged Slow-Motion excerpt at: http://exposureroom.com/crashdet . .
A flourite tailings dam in the Italian Alps fails, sending a massive flood through the Val di Stava, destroying the towns of Tesoro and Stava, and costing 265 lives. The dam is found to have had defects in design and maintenance, with implications for other tailings dams worldwide.
Why planes crash and new aviation methods to reduce the number of future crashes.
An expert climber climbing Mt. Johnson in Alaska suffers a serious accident, forcing his partner and himself to face death again and again in an attempt to survive long enough to be rescued.
Ultra Science: Survival in the Deep
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Air Crash Investigation: DC10: American Airlines, Turkish Airlines
A design flaw in the DC-10 aircraft dooms a Turkish Airlines flight outside of Paris, with over 300 deaths. A defect in the closing mechanism for the cargo door caused it to open in flight, depressurizing the plane and causing the crash. The defect had been discovered earlier in an American Airlines DC-10, which made an emergency landing in Detroit, but no airworthiness directive was issued, and lack of clear communication led to the fatal Turkish Airlines flight.
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