This whole thing is so incredible - planes knocked out of the sky, debris raining down on the town. My brain keeps focusing on that anchor - imagine being a couple miles away from the port, hearing an explosion, and then a freaking ANCHOR falls out of the sky. Mind-boggling!!
AND not just any old "boat anchor" you can get at Wally World or some Marine Outfitter shop, the anchor to a friggin' CARGO SHIP... I highly recommend a trek to Texas City and touring some of the memorial park, to see for yourself. They've kept a propeller (I think from the Grand Camp, but I may be mistaken) because it was blown some 2 miles to shore... Imagine running like hell for your life from that thing!!! ;o)
My grandad was 31 in 1947. He said that the TC explosion knocked him out of bed & he lived in Corpus Christi Texas. He thought that the refinery that he worked at had exploded. 😳
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time. Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them). Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI). Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy. Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful. Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI). Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad). Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning! Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures. Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement. It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them. (19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).. Salam (Peace)
"blew two planes cleanly out of the sky", "cargo was launched high into the air...some at supersonic speeds", "some fires...quickly extinguished by a two-story tidal wave caused by the explosion", etc. Holy smokes, those are some insane details of the devastation.
Some say the explosion even blew a meteorite out of its course causing it to crash on the town, and that it created a porthole to another dimension that sucked people in...
I'm from the Texas city area and grew up hearing stories of that explosion from my grandfather who was a shrimp boat Captain. At the Texas City Dike the propeller still sits as a monument. I believe it was throw 2 miles onto shore. ITS AS BIG AS A SCHOOL BUS ! Edit: I'm sorry I remembered incorrectly, it wasn't the propeller that was thrown. It was the anchor. I wrote this before watching the whole video. The prop is giant though. As a kid I couldn't wrap my head around how that had been thrown that far away by an explosion. If you haven't Google the propeller in Texas city. Really gives good scale to size of ship that was vaporized instantly.
@@Sonjalynn97 exactly, everyone gets pissy when I ask which time they are talking about... Then you hear well my so and so was there in it, ok, once again, which explosion.🤦
One of the coolest memories of my life, as a Texas City native all my 27 years, was interviewing a Disaster survivor, Ms. Thelma Dyes. I was in third grade and had to do a report on a real person, including an in depth interview. She was 92 YEARS OLD at the time, and her mind was like a steel trap!!! She remembered every single little detail. I only wish I'd been older, and could have REALLY, DEEPLY appreciated what an amazing lady I was speaking to. I still have pages and pages of her hand written notes about that day that I will forever keep and cherish. Rest easy, Ms. Dyes! ❤️❤️❤️
@@ClickClack_Bam it really, truly was! I just so wish I could have been a little older, to truly understand the gravity of the situation and how lucky I was to speak with someone who lived through such a historic event. She talked about the glass windows shattering all over her body, the whole house shaking, doors being blown off their hinges. She was a hell of a lady, tough as nails. She was my grandmothers boss at the Southwestern Bell telephone company, now called AT&T. I was told she was very strict, but a good boss. Even in a time when hardcore women were looked down on as frosty bitches, she didn't care. She stayed stern and moved up the ranks of the company. You kind of had to be that way to a degree to be in a position of power like that as a woman in the 1940's and 50's. I was lucky enough to attend her 95th birthday! She lived to be almost 100 years old! One hell of a lady for sure. ❤️❤️❤️
Our schools have went to shit since then. That was back in the day when you could actually get a great education. And they gave homework assignments daily. I caught the end of a great education system since I was born in 75
@@tonyploma2330 I was born in 80 graduated in 98 so I know what you mean. These days the teachers can't wait to tell your 6 year old what type of sex they had with their same sex partner & then break down the different terms for the actions they went through. I'd be homicidal if I had kids in school.
This was the event that ended up keeping ammonium nitrate away from docks and populated areas. That's why the Beirut explosion was such a shock; it was already well known how dangerous ammonium nitrate is and that nearly everywhere in the world its mandated to be put far from populated areas after this event.
Winston-Salem, NC almost learned this the hard way earlier this year. A fertilizer plant that had been built in 1929 caught on fire; in the decades since it was built, the city had grown around it. It was grandfathered in to remain where it was. Luckily, the plant didn't explode since it stored its materials properly, but it definitely won't be rebuilding in the same place!
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time. Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them). Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI). Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy. Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful. Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI). Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad). Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning! Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures. Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement. It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them. (19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).. Salam (Peace)
The moment I heard "Union Carbide", I knew some impending shitshow is about to happen. It's never a dull moment seeing you cover disasters, not just the morbid curiosity of it, but in the same way, you see how we 1) learn from it and made further developments to prevent such disasters, and 2) show that how no matter what prevention is made, something is very much bound to happen one way or another. Found you at Summerland Disaster, been an avid subscriber since. Cheers, man! Commenting for the algorithm to drive some traffic your way!
The big problem with trying to smother the fire with steam was rooted in two basic facts. One, ammonium nitrate provides its own oxidizer. This is what makes it such an energetic explosive. But more importantly, oxidizers make fires hard or impossible to smother because they make the oxidizer side of the Fire Tetrahedron (fuel, oxidizer, heat, chemical reaction) unbreakable. And strong oxidizers, at high temperatures, can turn all *sorts* of materials into fuel, sometimes including substances that aren't normally thought of as flammable. (Look up chlorine trifluoride sometime -- its range of fuels amounts to 'whatever's there'.) The other fact was heat. As a general rule, every 10° C increase in temperature doubles a reaction rate. (This sounds like a vague rule of thumb, but it's actually close enough to exact that even engineers can handwave the difference.) Pumping steam into the hold was adding not only heat but also thermal inertia. In other words, the steam in the air was retaining heat in the hold, and acting like a blanket while the ongoing chemical reaction was heating everything, so that temperature, and therefore reaction rate, was increasing all the faster. The one effective way to put out this fire would have been to cool it. That would have meant either unloading the ship to separate the sacks from each other in a big big hurry -- not on, and thank $DEITY they didn't put a couple hundred stevedores onto that job -- or, put simply, drown the cargo. Of course, it's easy to sit here in 2022 and explain all this. But this was 1947, the people fighting the fire weren't chemical engineers, and fire science wasn't nearly as advanced. They were sensibly applying a 'tried-and-true' method of fighting a ship fire, not understanding that this particular cargo wasn't going to play nice.
Exactly! What they loaded into the hold certainly had the makings of one spectacular chemistry experiment! While the image used to illustrate the sacks of ammonium-nitrate appear to be plastic sacking, which are used today to reduce water absorption, back in 1947 the sacks would have been jute/burlap/hessian & therefore not so good at keeping moisture at bay!
In 1947 I still think they should have scuttled the 2nd ship when the couldn't move it prior to it exploding also. As you said drowning the cargo would have worked. And I agree completely for the first ship easy to say what they should have done 65 years later but that one was probably going to happen no matter what at that time.
It is unfortunate that hindsight is what has caused safety regulations and procedure to be enacted. Also interesting use of the word "Tetrahedron" , pleasant if unexpected.
For a disaster that sent two massive explosions through Texas City, it's remarkable how the city recovered as well as it did. But what can be described as one of the worst disasters of the 20th century, it's sad for a great many people that so many victims were not identified. And why is it with disasters such as these, that compensation for people who need and deserve it, why is it paid so slowly?
Theres only so much momey at one time. PLUS you will have many many leeches, trying to get a quick payout, who had noone involved. So you have to seriously vet and double and tripple check who actually deserves support, and who's lieing to get a quick buck.
Thanks so much for covering this disaster. My mother lived in Texas City when the Disaster occurred. She was a teenager and she happened to be absent from school that day. The students at school suffered injuries from flying glass from windows, so I'm glad she wasn't in school that day. I was told that the school gymnasium was turned into a morgue.
It was. The high school gym was one of the few buildings with enough open space to serve as a morgue and the football field was where many memorial services were held.
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time. Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them). Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI). Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy. Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful. Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI). Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad). Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning! Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures. Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement. It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them. (19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).. Salam (Peace)
To get an idea about the magnitude of the explosion, the Texas City disaster is roughly similar to the Beirut explosion in 2020. The people nearby stood no chance of survival.
The Halifax Explosion three decades earlier was worse than this explosion, it killed 2000 people and it was the largest non-nuclear explosion in history. Another similarity with the Halifax Explosion was munitions being a contributing factor, it happened during WW1. One of the ships involved in the collision was a French munitions ship.
I get the whole human curiosity thing, but I can't for the life of me imagine seeing "unusually colored smoke" coming from a fire and not immediately thinking it has to be toxic and I probably shouldn't be anywhere even remotely near by.
The knowledge that people could have about this sort of stuff back then wasn't the same as today. Today, with the internet, TV and other news/social outlet, we know more and more about this sort of stuff. But back then, it probably wasn't well known
To be fair in 1947 not that many people, including officials knew how bad an ammonium nitrate explosion can be. I believe if it happened to da regular passerbys would also not understand how large of a radius that potential explosion will claim.
People just seem to think that the only poisonous thing is the cloud you can visibly see. Not caring about invisible dangers. And of course, they didn’t see the explosion coming… …well, the pedestrians at least, people who knew what the cargo was could have known. Literal ammunition on board, and all.
The explosion was larger than anyone could have possibly imagined - they figured surely they were safe at that distance from anything they could have believed possible. As for the potentially toxic smoke, that depends on wind direction. You're probably safer 20 meters upwind of it than 5 kilometers downwind.
I live about 80 miles up the coast from Texas City. It was my great honor to meet and know a retired Fire Chief. He told me that he was part of a team sent to help with the recovery of Texas City. They sent two fire trucks and crew to help. All of their equipment was destroyed. Most of the fire fighters were killed.
According to Bill Minutaglio’s book “City on Fire,” this was the worst single-incident loss suffered by any US fire department prior to the September 11 attacks.
It sounds pretty normal actually. It sounds absolutely stupid a regular citizen suing his country his government... They should only be able to sue individual government figures but not the entire government!
OK! Freaky, my mom and I were just talking about this tonight! She still remembers the sound of the explosion and later going out there to see it. My Grandpa liked to fish out there but my Grandma said no after the explosion.
@@babsgalv6556 I am not a dummy. I was just sharing my story. My grandmother never ate catfish/bottom feeders, Shrimp etc. I was not talking about going fishing a day later. I meant for years, she said no.
Thanks for your presentation of this disaster. I was born in Texas City in 1966, and lived in Lamarque, which is basically right next door. Me and my grandmother were best friends, and spent countless days fishing the Texas City dike and crabbing any body of water that she would let me throw a chicken neck in. I remember her telling the story of the seemingly apocalyptic event to me many times. I’ve seen the memorial and the anchor, and even though I was very young , it was hard to fathom the amount of force it would take to launch the anchor that far away. Union Carbide was literally at the end of my street ( Pear street, for any of you lamarque dwellers) and, one night when I was probably six or seven, it erupted with a large explosion , blowing the glass out of our house. I remember being terrified, especially thinking of the loss of life from the stories my grandmother told.But, my parents and grandparents all decided enough is enough, and we loaded the wagons and headed north, which was at the time, way out in the country. Willis , Texas.
Thank you for covering this! As a fourth-generation Houstonian, I'm aware of this disaster (have read the great book City on Fire recommended in another comment), but it sometimes gets forgotten in other locales. When I saw what happened in Beirut in 2020, many were speculating that it was a terror attack. Because of this tragedy, as well as what happened in West, Texas in 2013, I immediately knew in my gut that it was due to ammonium nitrate. Both would be interesting stories for you to cover. Great job as usual!
My grandfather was a bus driver nearby and helped move survivors out of the area to hospitals, nice to learn more about this part of our history. Thank you.
From the title I thought this was going to be about the 2005 Texas City BP oil refinary explosion, but this is definately a more disasterous explosion.
I read a book called City on Fire read it over and over. Good book to read if you want to find out more. There were some wild pics in Life magazine from this time. Absolutly horrifying.
@@Jessica-ml6td I got kind of obsessed with this tragedy. Another good book is The Circus Fire about the fire at the big top in the 40's as well. My Mom said she would never go to a circus in a tent ever again after that happened. Wild.
I've been wondering when you would get to this one. My grandparents grew up in Texas City and were kids at the time. My grandfather remembered the day well. It happened during school, and some of the kids heard about it before and left school to go see the burning ship in the harbor. One thing he remembered very well, was that all the windows were blown out for miles, and there was a glass shortage. Said it took a really long time before his family could get window panes replaces in their house.
not really surprising that a company that deals with manufacturing and moving large amounts of chemicals have had disasters. Its like how most grease fires start in kitchens.
Union Carbide is a major manufacture of some of the most dangerous chemicals that make our modern lives possible. Considering the sheer volume and type of materials they have to deal with it's inevitable they'd be part of so many incidents.
To be fair, you've got to keep this in the mix. Union Carbide's business model always relied on being a prime technological innovator in working with energetic, toxic, or otherwise hazardous materials. Somebody is necessarily going to be in that position; whoever is, is more or less automatically the poster child for tombstone technology and will become the folks who learn and teach industrial safety the rugged way. That is life on the bleeding edge, and the second gen will always have a better safety record because they're benefiting from the first gen's hard lessons. (Eventually, some of that second gen become big enough and/or lucky enough to jump on some new tech, and then they become the first gen teaching the lessons, and Tombstone Technology marches on!)
Awesome, thanks for sharing this with me. The statistics/distances included here blew my mind. Just the distance that enormous anchor traveled is incredibly terrifying
I don't think of this really as a horror channel at all - it's a disaster documentary channel. Some of the early stuff was more horror-esque, talking about crazy murderers and stuff, but evolved to amusement park accidents, then mostly industrial and building disasters. Now more akin to "Seconds from Disaster" but without the sensationalizing BS and more informative.
Dude I have gotten absolutely hooked on your channel. I love the clean professional tone of your delivery, showing great respect to the unfortunate victims while not delving into sobstory territory.
Thank you for presenting this. It is one of those disasters that shows how blind people were to dangers even 70 years ago. I lived in Texas City in the 1980s and spoke with the Pastor emeritus at our church in LaMarque (next door to Texas City and filled with plant workers). He said everyone in the area was personally affected because there wasn't anyone who did not lose a friend or a family member in the disaster. He said he did almost non-stop funerals for weeks. One thing I like about this channel is how it explains what was done in the aftermath and how safety measures changed. The plants in Texas City are still not 100% safe and it seems there is an explosion (not of this magnitude, but felt) about twice a decade. One that happened when I lived there filled the sky with black soot and, once a passing cloud provided rain, all the cars not under roofs were covered in a runny black soot that looked as if a child had fingerpainted every vehicle for miles around. The car washes had a booming business for weeks.
I genuinely appreciate how you translate measurements to suit us Americans. You don't HAVE to do that, but you do and I know that I for one, appreciate the attention to detail... Also, it must be said that it's refreshing to watch videos without promo plugs in every single one... When you DO feature sponsors it's done in the best way which should be standard across the platform! All around, you are among the best creators on the platform!
My grandpa was a schoolboy in Galveston when this happened. The windows in his classroom shattered. My great grandfather worked in Texas City on the docks but this happened to be his day off.
One of my Air Force roommates lived in Texas City. He remembers family members talking about the disaster. His original family home (built just before WWII) was destroyed in the explosion. No one was killed as the family was up in Galveston for a get together. But the dogs (cared for by a neighbor) were killed by the concussive wave and the neighbor was working at Monsanto and killed in the SS Grandcamp blast. When they got back a week later (the authorities wouldn't let them back in the area until all the fires were out.). They found the neighbors wife and two kids still alive (but inconsolable due to the husband's death.). The wife ended up in a psychiatric institute and the kids went to live with other family members. His family home was in pieces and their dogs had been dead for a week. They recovered what they could and bought some property outside of town to rebuild (as did many residents of Texas City). His dad (a longshoreman and ex-serviceman) got hired (at very good pay) to rebuild the Monsanto plant and eventually retired years later as a production foreman at the plant. The town still had memorial services on the day of the disaster every year when he was living there in the 60's and 70's. The anchor from the SS Grandcamp landed about 2 miles from his house in an open field. He remembers it as part of a memorial park when he'd drive into town later as a teenager to pick his dad from work at the new plant. It was eventually moved to a museum long after he left the city to join the Air Force. He retired from the service and moved somewhere away from Texas City. He doesn't trust chemical factories for some reason.
My mouth was agape for mist of this video. Mostly because the absolute horror of this but also because I’d never heard anything about this before. How’d I miss out on this disaster for so long?
I grew up (in Texas) hearing about this, but never understood the details until now - so thank you. The ammonium nitrate explosion more recently in the town of West, Texas, is worth looking at. Lessons not learned.
You did it! I had requested for you to cover this one and thank you for doing it! My daddy was pretty close to there when this happened. He would take us all around there fishing usually but also showing us kids where all this happened. Thanks again!! There's another great channel who covers disasters called morbid Midnight yall
I live here, and went through the 2005 explosion while in HS. I'll never forget watching the shockwave ripple through the grass outside our classroom, and the windows bowing in. Can't imagine what THIS explosion was like.
My Sister was in that explosion, she worked at BP , the women in the office was just screaming, she had to take charge and tell them to SHUT UP and evacuate
I remember that day I was the class of 2006 my girlfriend at the time was in the school and I left early to go to work felt the shockwave hit my house as I was getting ready felt like a tanker truck flipped over she told me similar things that happened in school this town sometimes I believe it's cursed
@@MGW27 I wonder if the explosion looked the same too with how it was just like a massive bubble of smoke from the shockwave consuming everything around it
Another great video! I thought maybe you should make a video about 1963 Skopje earthquake... It was very deadly and particularly scary because entire city was built in a highly seismic area with no earthquake proof building standards.
That explosion must have been was absolutely terrifying i can't imagine what iit must have been like to be a resident there at the time during the moment ig happened.
My dad was 50 miles away and said his hat blew off his head and you could feel the Earth shake. He would always tear up when he told the story. Just so many people gone
if you want so see how something like this looks then i will link to two recent incidents that are smaller but still completely unhinged Tianjin port explosions 2015 (one "small" explosion first then the big one comes right after) ua-cam.com/video/hUtrkfLKyFE/v-deo.html beirut port explosion 2020 (looks like a real fucking nuke went off) ua-cam.com/video/NFjDq-Rsyjo/v-deo.html the scale of these things are just insane
Love Tuesdays because of your videos. Tragic disaster very well told. So enjoy your voice, pronunciation and calm delivery. If the title said 'today im going to read cereal boxes' i would still 'like' and listen intently. Thank you for all your good work.
Terrific (though horrific) episode K-man! Reminds me of Halifax, but with more victims, more destruction sadly. Great work, although I notice you haven’t been including any stories of specific individuals in recent episodes whereas you once did this often?? Regardless, bravo!
Halifax was way worse, 2,000+ people died and several thousand were injured with 10,000’s of buildings severely damaged, the explosion was also around 2.7 kilo tons big
@@cranksetwrench oh, well then I stand corrected. One of my favorite FH episodes was the Halifax one. It inspired me to watch atleast a few more videos on the subject. So sad that so many hardworking people were impacted by such an avoidable accident. I guess I misremembered the numbers. Both are indeed fascinating horror tales for sure!
My grand uncle was there, worked there at the port, survived and wrote a 30 page diary of everything he saw and felt. I got this diary when he died and along with it was several pieces of melted metal from the disaster. He could get back home to Galveston Island and so walked the 61 miles to piney point village on the northwest side of Houston to his sister-in-laws home where he wrote his diary.
Thank you for doing this. I grew up in east Houston, near the ship channel. Every once in a while, the local TV stations would do a documentary on this disaster with some really good quality (for the the 1940s) filming. I haven't lived there in over 30 years, so I have not seen it in a while. Although my parents did not witness it first hand, they made sure we understood that we lived near 37 chemical plants and when you heard the air raid sirens go off, get inside immediately.
Oh my gosh! I've been waiting for this! I live in Texas and I learned about this story from my grandparents, who were young when it happened. In addition to this story, they told me about the New London school explosion, because my grandmother's parents lived near the area when that happened. Thank you for covering this.
Man, ALWAYS the highest caliber content and narration. I absolutely LOVE this channel, and if UA-cam had a platinum level showcase of subscription worthy uploaders, Fascinating Horror would be right up there in the top 5. 💙
Great video, thanks! Even when I'm familiar with an event and seen other creator's videos, you always have details that are new to me and the quality of your productions are fantastic.
My great uncle was the Texas City public health director when this happened. He rarely if ever spoke about it. His wife did tell me what he did. Among the things that he had to do was to catalog the body parts prior to burial in a mass grave. He also had to conduct the coroner inquiries into the disposition of the status of the missing persons. His prior experience in France in Patton's 3rd Army was very effective in getting the injured to hospitals in Galveston and Houston for treatment.
It reminds me of that Mythbusters episode where they tried to test if a water heater exploding in a house fire would put the fire out. I can't remember the results, maybe it did but it destroyed most of what remained of the house in the process. Which I guess is a "success," as a house that isn't there can't be on fire. Same conclusion for a tsunami - probably swept away the houses, so whether or not it put out the fire is a moot point.
Pure definition of a shit-show. It's horrible but absolutely fascinating at the same time how forced can work together to create even more destruction.
I'd never heard of this! Wow! Kind of reminds me of the explosion we had here in NV. Pepcon in Henderson. That's a day I'll never forget, definitely nothing on the scale of death or destruction of Texas City! Scary as hell! I was living in a high-rise apartment building at the time, I thought a plane went down as it was towards the airport! This was in the 80's when Vegas was still small. The whole town was freaked out I remember. Especially finding out about rocket fuel being made in our little town. Lol... Love your channel, great information! ✌
My parents, newlyweds at the time, lived in a garage apartment, some miles away from the harbor. My mom said that the windows were blown out from the explosion and there was structural damage. Fortunately, they were out of town the day of the explosion.
Given the proximity of the docks in Beirut to the city centre, and how densely populated the surrounding neighbourhoods are, it's an absolute miracle that the death toll wasn't in the tens of thousands. Ammonium nitrate is nasty, nasty stuff.
Have you done a video yet on the tri-state tornado? A freak tornado that defies category, traveling across three states at 70 mph and leveling everything in its way. Also, you may find some interest in the locust swatms that used to terrorize the US in state-spanning clouds before suddenly going extinct.
My grandfather had been working on the Grandcamp overnight. My great uncle died in the explosion. My grandparents home, about 12 blocks from the pier, had shrapnel in the front door.
"Hey, you know those bags with tons of Ammonia Nitrate we just loaded?" "Yeah, that super combustible fertilizer?" "Exactly... they were oddly warm when we loaded them, way warmer than any of the other cargo. Ho hum... when's break?"
I grew up in TC. The entire volunteer fire department were all killed in this blast! Ammonium Nitrate is dangerous material if you don’t know what you are doing! I know many many people who lost family members in this catastrophe! God bless these lost souls!
Ooh, I remember suggesting this at some point! Thanks so much for covering it. I learned a lot more than I did when I read about it. This format also really helps show the impact the disaster had.
I always find your documentaries to be fascinating. I wanted to especially thank you for using American measurement as well as metric. It is greatly appreciated.
Completely off-topic but I've just realised how much I'd love to watch a Fascinating Horror video of the (entirely fictional) 2007 Mystery Flesh Pit Disaster. It feels like the perfect fit.
That would be a great April Fool’s video! He’s done one for the 1975 Amity Island incident (Jaws) and the 1993 Isla Nublar incident (Jurassic Park) the past two years. I would love to see him go over MFPNP.
Growing up in Houston and taking trips to Galveston multiple times a year, whenever we passed Texas City on the drive down my mom would always say something to the effect of “there’s Texas City, the city that explodes”. She never mentioned these big explosions, so little me just assumed she meant like small little explosions on the daily like in the stuff you can see coming from the processing plants? I’m sure she was thinking of the 2005 explosion, and she doesn’t even know about the 1947 one. I never knew how devastating they actually were, much less that there were 2 of them that day (roughly). Thanks for covering such a wide range of incidents!
I grew up in/near Texas City. My great grandmom told me about the day the disaster happened. She was in a car driving with her family away from the city because of the fire that was raging at the docks. When the explosion happened, she looked back and saw the sky was filled with tiny specks/shards of what she thought was balsa wood (the wood that lines boat decks). Those shards were actually huge hunks of metal from the hull hurling through the sky, carried by the explosion. Also, there actually multiple anchors recovered from the ships. One sits at the Texas City Memorial, like is described in the video, but there's also another anchor in the front of the Texas City Museum, found in the older part of town.
I lived in Texas City for a couple years, but this is the first time I've heard the story! I still have family in the area, I'll have to look for the anchor next time I'm visiting.
It might have been worth saying that a molecule of ammonium nitrate contains more than enough oxygen for complete combustion of the substance. So the fire triangle of fuel, oxygen and source of ignition doesn’t apply: ammonium nitrate is both a fuel and a source of oxygen. In fact, ammonium nitrate has excess oxygen, so if it is mixed with fuel, you can have a fire and/or explosion with no air present. Mixtures of ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel have been used as an explosive. Using firefighting techniques that exclude air, such as battening down the hatches and filling the holds with steam, or using a CO2 extinguisher, don’t have a chance of working on an ammonium nitrate fire. People might ask why we bother with making ammonium nitrate, if it is so dangerous. The answer is that it is an excellent nitrogenous fertiliser.
Ammonium Nitrate also acts as an explosive extender for oxygen poor explosives like TNT giving the same yield as the more expensive pure TNT. Ammonia is a precursor to making Nitric acid - so making ammonium nitrate is a very simple additional step for nitric acid plants.
@@jerry2357 As an industrial engineer, I have also seen sump pump’s rapidly disassemble when water contaminated with Ammonium Nitrate is pumped through them (particularly if the discharge is blocked). Volute temperature sensors are strongly recommended… Ammonia has its own issues…
My grandpa worked there. He always said it was caused by a sailor who had hobnails on his shoes and sparked when he walked across a catwalk on the ship.
My mother and grandparents lived in Texas City at the time. My mom was showered in glass when the windows blew in at the school, and my grandfather survived only because he was home sick that day from work on the docks. My grandmother was so traumatized by the event, she spoke of it often for the rest of her life.
I have seen several documentaries, programs, etc over the last 50 yrs of this tragedy. You did a superb job of telling it in a suscinct and stylish manner. I have been to T.C. many times from 1992 to 2008, my in laws lived near there.
When I saw the Texas City Disaster as the title I assumed you were going to discuss the explosion at BP’s refinery in 2005. I’m a traveling refinery and chemical plant instrumentation technician about to start work in Minnesota, so I was like “Oh, that’s a bad omen…” haha I love the channel. Been subbed for years now. Keep up the amazing stories.
I saw the anchor as a kid on a scout trip to TX City around 1996. A friend and I were able to look into it and give a history story to our troop. We got a merit badge for it and 25 yrs later, a great job because one of the troop leaders remembered me doing that.
I had heard that the one Texas City firefighter that survived didn’t respond to the call, because he was working on his roof. It wasn’t like “he was fortunate to survive”. All I keep wondering is “what went through his mind at the moment of the explosion?”
It’s amazing knowing I’ve worked on the dike, Valero refinery, BP/Marathon refinery, DOW, and the old Textin sites there, and the only way of knowing about this is the little memorials around town.
I wonder if you would be interested in covering the Roseburg Blast that happened in a small town in Oregon, United States, in 1959. A truck loaded with dynamite and ammonium nitrate caught fire and exploded, killing over a dozen and causing destruction over a thirty-block radius. Much like the Grandcamp's anchor, one of the truck's axles was blasted into the air and landed over three blocks away. One of the worst disasters in Oregon history. Thank you for another great video, and for the wonderful work you do in general. I've really been enjoying your channel over the past couple of years and hope to enjoy it for many more.
If you are from FARM COUNTRY, the words "ammonium nitrate" and "ammunition" should never be in the same sentence, let alone the same ship.. This is a lesson the people of Beirut, Lebanon just had to re-learn
This is the third disaster with ammonium nitrate that I know of. The same stuff that destroyed the port of Beirut in 2020... How many times will history repeat itself?!
It's also what made up the makeshift car bomb in the Oklahoma City bombing. The stuff is common, cheap, and essential for agriculture, so this will keep happening for a very long time.
I'm finding these stories so sad but they're fascinating. I'm wondering if those who make them would do a story on the Hazelwood coal fire mine, in country Victoria in 2014. This fire was huge and went for weeks, affecting thousands of nearby residents with toxic fumes and ash.
I’m thinking after Beirut this is back in the forefront of people’s minds. The world unfortunately needs a reminder every few decades to reinforce the fact that AN is dangerous stuff.
@@Battlefox64_RL I happened again in West, Texas. "fire and explosion at the West Fertilizer Co. on April 17, 2013, in the rural town of West. The explosion flattened the farming community of 2,800 people, just north of Waco, turning some 500 homes into rubble as residents tried desperately to flee the horrific scene. Over 200 people were injured.
This whole thing is so incredible - planes knocked out of the sky, debris raining down on the town. My brain keeps focusing on that anchor - imagine being a couple miles away from the port, hearing an explosion, and then a freaking ANCHOR falls out of the sky. Mind-boggling!!
AND not just any old "boat anchor" you can get at Wally World or some Marine Outfitter shop, the anchor to a friggin' CARGO SHIP...
I highly recommend a trek to Texas City and touring some of the memorial park, to see for yourself. They've kept a propeller (I think from the Grand Camp, but I may be mistaken) because it was blown some 2 miles to shore... Imagine running like hell for your life from that thing!!! ;o)
My grandad was 31 in 1947. He said that the TC explosion knocked him out of bed & he lived in Corpus Christi Texas. He thought that the refinery that he worked at had exploded. 😳
Yeah!
cooool!
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time.
Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them).
Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy.
Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful.
Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).
Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning!
Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures.
Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement.
It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them.
(19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad)..
Salam (Peace)
"blew two planes cleanly out of the sky", "cargo was launched high into the air...some at supersonic speeds", "some fires...quickly extinguished by a two-story tidal wave caused by the explosion", etc. Holy smokes, those are some insane details of the devastation.
Some say the explosion even blew a meteorite out of its course causing it to crash on the town, and that it created a porthole to another dimension that sucked people in...
@@Stichting_NoFa-p I heard right before the portal closed hitler came out of it
I'm curious, any details of the stricken aircraft?
@@Lysergic_ no, that was Trump. It’s actually his birthday, look it up.
@@Stichting_NoFa-p pretty sure you mean wormhole
I'm from the Texas city area and grew up hearing stories of that explosion from my grandfather who was a shrimp boat Captain. At the Texas City Dike the propeller still sits as a monument. I believe it was throw 2 miles onto shore. ITS AS BIG AS A SCHOOL BUS !
Edit:
I'm sorry I remembered incorrectly, it wasn't the propeller that was thrown. It was the anchor. I wrote this before watching the whole video. The prop is giant though. As a kid I couldn't wrap my head around how that had been thrown that far away by an explosion. If you haven't Google the propeller in Texas city. Really gives good scale to size of ship that was vaporized instantly.
Holy crap 😧
I’m from Seabrook/Kemah. I remember hearing of many explosions throughout the years.
@@Sonjalynn97 exactly, everyone gets pissy when I ask which time they are talking about... Then you hear well my so and so was there in it, ok, once again, which explosion.🤦
That is insane. The anchor also was blown 2 miles away.
FROM TC GO STINGS!
One of the coolest memories of my life, as a Texas City native all my 27 years, was interviewing a Disaster survivor, Ms. Thelma Dyes. I was in third grade and had to do a report on a real person, including an in depth interview. She was 92 YEARS OLD at the time, and her mind was like a steel trap!!! She remembered every single little detail. I only wish I'd been older, and could have REALLY, DEEPLY appreciated what an amazing lady I was speaking to. I still have pages and pages of her hand written notes about that day that I will forever keep and cherish. Rest easy, Ms. Dyes! ❤️❤️❤️
Wow. That's neat you talked to someone who witnessed that event.
@@ClickClack_Bam it really, truly was! I just so wish I could have been a little older, to truly understand the gravity of the situation and how lucky I was to speak with someone who lived through such a historic event. She talked about the glass windows shattering all over her body, the whole house shaking, doors being blown off their hinges. She was a hell of a lady, tough as nails. She was my grandmothers boss at the Southwestern Bell telephone company, now called AT&T. I was told she was very strict, but a good boss. Even in a time when hardcore women were looked down on as frosty bitches, she didn't care. She stayed stern and moved up the ranks of the company. You kind of had to be that way to a degree to be in a position of power like that as a woman in the 1940's and 50's. I was lucky enough to attend her 95th birthday! She lived to be almost 100 years old! One hell of a lady for sure. ❤️❤️❤️
What an amazing experience to be able to talk to her about this!
Our schools have went to shit since then. That was back in the day when you could actually get a great education. And they gave homework assignments daily. I caught the end of a great education system since I was born in 75
@@tonyploma2330 I was born in 80 graduated in 98 so I know what you mean.
These days the teachers can't wait to tell your 6 year old what type of sex they had with their same sex partner & then break down the different terms for the actions they went through.
I'd be homicidal if I had kids in school.
This was the event that ended up keeping ammonium nitrate away from docks and populated areas. That's why the Beirut explosion was such a shock; it was already well known how dangerous ammonium nitrate is and that nearly everywhere in the world its mandated to be put far from populated areas after this event.
Exactly. Same problem with the Tianjin explosion in 2015.
Winston-Salem, NC almost learned this the hard way earlier this year. A fertilizer plant that had been built in 1929 caught on fire; in the decades since it was built, the city had grown around it. It was grandfathered in to remain where it was. Luckily, the plant didn't explode since it stored its materials properly, but it definitely won't be rebuilding in the same place!
Well... Look up the AZF explosion in France, there is a lot of places like that,where the city expand and end up waaay too close to dangerous sites
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time.
Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them).
Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy.
Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful.
Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).
Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning!
Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures.
Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement.
It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them.
(19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad)..
Salam (Peace)
@@sirenarcana I heard from my science teacher in high school that you should not mix nitrate and fire. She had family at this disaster as a child.
The moment I heard "Union Carbide", I knew some impending shitshow is about to happen.
It's never a dull moment seeing you cover disasters, not just the morbid curiosity of it, but in the same way, you see how we 1) learn from it and made further developments to prevent such disasters, and 2) show that how no matter what prevention is made, something is very much bound to happen one way or another.
Found you at Summerland Disaster, been an avid subscriber since. Cheers, man! Commenting for the algorithm to drive some traffic your way!
Exactly what I thought. Why did any other country let them in?
Notorious
Union carbide Dow and Monsanto …. Nothing good if your hear them mentioned
His style of presentation and delivery is second to none.
Same. I got flashbacks of the Bhopal video as soon as I heard Union Carbide!
The big problem with trying to smother the fire with steam was rooted in two basic facts.
One, ammonium nitrate provides its own oxidizer. This is what makes it such an energetic explosive. But more importantly, oxidizers make fires hard or impossible to smother because they make the oxidizer side of the Fire Tetrahedron (fuel, oxidizer, heat, chemical reaction) unbreakable. And strong oxidizers, at high temperatures, can turn all *sorts* of materials into fuel, sometimes including substances that aren't normally thought of as flammable. (Look up chlorine trifluoride sometime -- its range of fuels amounts to 'whatever's there'.)
The other fact was heat. As a general rule, every 10° C increase in temperature doubles a reaction rate. (This sounds like a vague rule of thumb, but it's actually close enough to exact that even engineers can handwave the difference.) Pumping steam into the hold was adding not only heat but also thermal inertia. In other words, the steam in the air was retaining heat in the hold, and acting like a blanket while the ongoing chemical reaction was heating everything, so that temperature, and therefore reaction rate, was increasing all the faster.
The one effective way to put out this fire would have been to cool it. That would have meant either unloading the ship to separate the sacks from each other in a big big hurry -- not on, and thank $DEITY they didn't put a couple hundred stevedores onto that job -- or, put simply, drown the cargo.
Of course, it's easy to sit here in 2022 and explain all this. But this was 1947, the people fighting the fire weren't chemical engineers, and fire science wasn't nearly as advanced. They were sensibly applying a 'tried-and-true' method of fighting a ship fire, not understanding that this particular cargo wasn't going to play nice.
Exactly! What they loaded into the hold certainly had the makings of one spectacular chemistry experiment!
While the image used to illustrate the sacks of ammonium-nitrate appear to be plastic sacking, which are used today to reduce water absorption, back in 1947 the sacks would have been jute/burlap/hessian & therefore not so good at keeping moisture at bay!
This is an amazingly clear technical explanation--your time and knowledge are appreciated. :)
Wonderful explanation. Thank you for sharing this.
In 1947 I still think they should have scuttled the 2nd ship when the couldn't move it prior to it exploding also. As you said drowning the cargo would have worked. And I agree completely for the first ship easy to say what they should have done 65 years later but that one was probably going to happen no matter what at that time.
It is unfortunate that hindsight is what has caused safety regulations and procedure to be enacted. Also interesting use of the word "Tetrahedron" , pleasant if unexpected.
For a disaster that sent two massive explosions through Texas City, it's remarkable how the city recovered as well as it did. But what can be described as one of the worst disasters of the 20th century, it's sad for a great many people that so many victims were not identified. And why is it with disasters such as these, that compensation for people who need and deserve it, why is it paid so slowly?
hoarding of capital by capitalists
Theres only so much momey at one time.
PLUS you will have many many leeches, trying to get a quick payout, who had noone involved.
So you have to seriously vet and double and tripple check who actually deserves support, and who's lieing to get a quick buck.
Because there's no profit involved in comping victims lmao.
@@manhathaway this.
Exactly. Look at how many people tried to cash in on 9/11 and other disasters. Imagine how easy it was to do a long time ago.
Thanks so much for covering this disaster. My mother lived in Texas City when the Disaster occurred. She was a teenager and she happened to be absent from school that day. The students at school suffered injuries from flying glass from windows, so I'm glad she wasn't in school that day. I was told that the school gymnasium was turned into a morgue.
It was. The high school gym was one of the few buildings with enough open space to serve as a morgue and the football field was where many memorial services were held.
Wow. What a blessing that she was not at school that day! I had never heard about this tragedy. So sad.
Pieces of debris landed almost 2 miles from the docks.
Hello ! May Allah protect and guide you to his light and happiness in this life and the hereafter, God bless, Ameen. Excuse me for giving a little presentation of Islam, because it is very misunderstood nowadays, especially on those « Antichrist's » times, where media and politics are mixed to distort history and truth. And terrorists (puppets of the Antichrist) who misinterpret verses, out of ignorance and political motivations, and take them out of historical context (just like radical atheists do by the way), don't help either. Thank you very much for your time.
Islam is an arabic word that means the Surrender to the One and Only God, our Creator, Protector, Provider, who gives us life and all that we have, we are safe and sound by his will and grace, we are His and to Him we return, and we have to thank him in this trial life by submitting to him by our free will, or later in the Day of judgment when it's too late to save our own skin. Islam was the original Religion descended to earth from heaven with Adam and Eve (peace and blessing be upon them) in the beginning of humanity. and was passed to people with the succession of the 124 000 prophets and 315 messengers of God to all nations and civilizations since, passing by Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ismaël, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, Solomon and Jesus (Peace and blessing be upon them) during the history of mankind, the last replaces and completes the previous, until the succession of the last messenger of God fourteen centuries ago, Muhammad (Peace and blessing be upon him) to complete the noble morals of all mankind, to bring humans and jinns out of darkness into light, and to purify people's religion and belief from corruption and polytheism, and return it to purity and true monotheism, like it was in the times of the prophets (Peace and blessing be upon them).
Many Religions that we know nowadays, at their beginning were true and under Islam, initiated by one of the prophets of God, but their original teachings, history and scriptures have been corrupted over time with falsification and polytheism, or lost and replaced with false ones. That's why Islam is the only Religion accepted by God nowadays, which consists in bearing witness that there is no god besides Allah (God in Aramaic, the original language of Jesus and the Gospel), and that Muhammad is His servant and messenger, just like Jesus and Moses and others are His servants and messengers. Never a messenger of God said he was God or literally son of God, it was the people after him who changed the words of God and corrupted the Religion. God is unique and absolute, He does not need to have a family and sons or to associate anyone else with His kingdom, He can simply create whatever He wants, everything belongs to Him, and to Him everything will return. Allah said in Surah Al-Mu’minun : “God has never begotten a son, nor is there any god besides Him. Otherwise, each god would have taken away what it has created, and some of them would have gained supremacy over others. Glory be to God, far beyond what they describe. The Knower of the hidden and the manifest. He is exalted, far above what they associate. (91-92 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah means the one and only God, the God of all prophets and creatures, the creator of the universe and mankind, and the Master of the Day of judgment, where our destiny, Hell or Paradise, is decided based on our faith and deeds in this trial life, and above all, Allah's mercy.
Allah said in Surah Al-Ikhlas : In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful.
Say, “He is God, the One. God, the Absolute. He begets not, nor was He begotten. And there is none comparable to Him.” (1-4 / Translated by ITANI).
Allah said in Surah An-Nisa : O FOLLOWERS of the Gospel! Do not overstep the bounds [of truth] in your religious beliefs, and do not say of God anything but the truth. The Christ Jesus, son of Mary, was but God's Apostle - [the fulfilment of] His promise which He had conveyed unto Mary - and a soul created by Him. Believe, then, in God and His apostles, and do not say, "[God is] a trinity". Desist [from this assertion] for your own good. God is but One God; utterly remote is He, in His glory, from having a son: unto Him belongs all that is in the heavens and all that is on earth; and none is as worthy of trust as God. Never did the Christ feel too proud to be God's servant, nor do the angels who are near unto Him. And those who feel too proud to serve Him and glory in their arrogance [should know that on Judgment Day] He will gather them all unto Himself: (171-172 / Translated by Muhammad Asad).
Allah the Most Merciful said in Surah Ali-Imran : Behold, the only [true] religion in the sight of God is [man's] self-surrender unto Him; and those who were vouchsafed revelation aforetime took, out of mutual jealousy, to divergent views [on this point] only after knowledge [thereof] had come unto them. But as for him who denies the truth of God's messages - behold, God is swift in reckoning!
Thus, [O Prophet,] if they argue with thee, say, "I have surrendered my whole being unto God, and [so have] all who follow me!" - and ask those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime, as well as all unlettered people, "Have you [too] surrendered yourselves unto Him?" And if they surrender themselves unto Him, they are on the right path; but if they turn away - behold, thy duty is no more than to deliver the message: for God sees all that is in [the hearts of] His creatures.
Verily, as for those who deny the truth of God's messages, and slay the prophets against all right, and slay people who enjoin equity - announce unto them a grievous chastisement.
It is they whose works shall come to nought both in this world and in the life to come; and they shall have none to succour them.
(19-22 / Translated by Muhammad Asad)..
Salam (Peace)
@@islamisthetruewaytogod6812 Nice to read a different religious point of view. Thanks for sharing!
So a government court found the government not liable? Seems pretty fair to me.
Government and ammonium nitrate is a very dangerous mixture, both in the US and Lebanon.
How convenient!
Some things never change.
You'd think outside arbiters would be better used in these cases
We have investigated ourselves and have determined that we did nothing wrong
Thanks for posting this. The disaster in Texas City is a story most Americans have never heard and know nothing about.
I think more people know about it than you’re giving credit to.
Which one? This isn't the only time TC has been "blown up"...
Probably cause the government was to blame and didn't compensate its citizens adequately.
As one of those peope, I feel it should really be talked about in school or something. Kind of a real big event.
@@TheOkamiProductions which event? TC has been "blown-up" several times... Everyone keeps forgetting this.
To get an idea about the magnitude of the explosion, the Texas City disaster is roughly similar to the Beirut explosion in 2020. The people nearby stood no chance of survival.
wait what about the Halifax explosion. Didn't it launch a ship like 1000 feet into the sky?
@@potato1907 Halifax was much larger than Texas and Beirut
The explosion registered on seismographs in Colorado. Texas City is my hometown. Born and raised.
This reminds me of the Halifax Explosion and the recent Beirut Explosion, both of which was also caused by ammonium nitrate.
In/near a port
The Halifax Explosion three decades earlier was worse than this explosion, it killed 2000 people and it was the largest non-nuclear explosion in history. Another similarity with the Halifax Explosion was munitions being a contributing factor, it happened during WW1. One of the ships involved in the collision was a French munitions ship.
The Halifax explosion was from explosives on the ship (mostly TNT and picric acid).
@@Justin.Franks oh you're right. I stand corrected.
Toulouse explosion in France.
I get the whole human curiosity thing, but I can't for the life of me imagine seeing "unusually colored smoke" coming from a fire and not immediately thinking it has to be toxic and I probably shouldn't be anywhere even remotely near by.
The knowledge that people could have about this sort of stuff back then wasn't the same as today. Today, with the internet, TV and other news/social outlet, we know more and more about this sort of stuff. But back then, it probably wasn't well known
600m looks pretty far and people probably thought it was safe even if there had been an explosion. It's about 3 Chicago city blocks
To be fair in 1947 not that many people, including officials knew how bad an ammonium nitrate explosion can be. I believe if it happened to da regular passerbys would also not understand how large of a radius that potential explosion will claim.
People just seem to think that the only poisonous thing is the cloud you can visibly see. Not caring about invisible dangers. And of course, they didn’t see the explosion coming… …well, the pedestrians at least, people who knew what the cargo was could have known. Literal ammunition on board, and all.
The explosion was larger than anyone could have possibly imagined - they figured surely they were safe at that distance from anything they could have believed possible. As for the potentially toxic smoke, that depends on wind direction. You're probably safer 20 meters upwind of it than 5 kilometers downwind.
I live about 80 miles up the coast from Texas City. It was my great honor to meet and know a retired Fire Chief. He told me that he was part of a team sent to help with the recovery of Texas City. They sent two fire trucks and crew to help. All of their equipment was destroyed. Most of the fire fighters were killed.
According to Bill Minutaglio’s book “City on Fire,” this was the worst single-incident loss suffered by any US fire department prior to the September 11 attacks.
Nobody cares
Crazy turn of events! What a surprise that government isn’t held to the same civilian standard 🙄
Tell me about it.
What do you mean it isnt? Half the time corporations get away scot free. Responsability for no one.
It sounds pretty normal actually. It sounds absolutely stupid a regular citizen suing his country his government... They should only be able to sue individual government figures but not the entire government!
@@DanipBlog you can…
The government creates the standard
OK! Freaky, my mom and I were just talking about this tonight! She still remembers the sound of the explosion and later going out there to see it. My Grandpa liked to fish out there but my Grandma said no after the explosion.
Probably because it killed half the fish living there and left debree in the waters
Did it sound gay?
Because the fish had feasted on the human bodies in the water, dummy. In Chile we would eat fish after the 2010 earthquake either.
@@babsgalv6556 I am not a dummy. I was just sharing my story. My grandmother never ate catfish/bottom feeders, Shrimp etc. I was not talking about going fishing a day later. I meant for years, she said no.
@@seemose what the hell is wrong with you
Thanks for your presentation of this disaster.
I was born in Texas City in 1966, and lived in Lamarque, which is basically right next door. Me and my grandmother were best friends, and spent countless days fishing the Texas City dike and crabbing any body of water that she would let me throw a chicken neck in.
I remember her telling the story of the seemingly apocalyptic event to me many times.
I’ve seen the memorial and the anchor, and even though I was very young , it was hard to fathom the amount of force it would take to launch the anchor that far away.
Union Carbide was literally at the end of my street ( Pear street, for any of you lamarque dwellers) and, one night when I was probably six or seven, it erupted with a large explosion , blowing the glass out of our house. I remember being terrified, especially thinking of the loss of life from the stories my grandmother told.But, my parents and grandparents all decided enough is enough, and we loaded the wagons and headed north, which was at the time, way out in the country. Willis , Texas.
Thank you for covering this! As a fourth-generation Houstonian, I'm aware of this disaster (have read the great book City on Fire recommended in another comment), but it sometimes gets forgotten in other locales. When I saw what happened in Beirut in 2020, many were speculating that it was a terror attack. Because of this tragedy, as well as what happened in West, Texas in 2013, I immediately knew in my gut that it was due to ammonium nitrate. Both would be interesting stories for you to cover. Great job as usual!
My grandfather was a bus driver nearby and helped move survivors out of the area to hospitals, nice to learn more about this part of our history. Thank you.
From the title I thought this was going to be about the 2005 Texas City BP oil refinary explosion, but this is definately a more disasterous explosion.
I read a book called City on Fire read it over and over. Good book to read if you want to find out more. There were some wild pics in Life magazine from this time. Absolutly horrifying.
Thanks for the recommendation!
Thanks for the suggestion as a history buff I'm looking for new books 📚 to read
@@Jessica-ml6td I got kind of obsessed with this tragedy. Another good book is The Circus Fire about the fire at the big top in the 40's as well. My Mom said she would never go to a circus in a tent ever again after that happened. Wild.
Yes! Excellent read!
@@heatherharper3406 A very good book.
I've been wondering when you would get to this one. My grandparents grew up in Texas City and were kids at the time. My grandfather remembered the day well. It happened during school, and some of the kids heard about it before and left school to go see the burning ship in the harbor. One thing he remembered very well, was that all the windows were blown out for miles, and there was a glass shortage. Said it took a really long time before his family could get window panes replaces in their house.
Its amazing how often the name Union carbide crops up in these disaster narrations is that company still working?
Union Carbide has since been bought up by DOW Chemicals, IIRC.
not really surprising that a company that deals with manufacturing and moving large amounts of chemicals have had disasters. Its like how most grease fires start in kitchens.
But for once UC wasn't the culprit.
Union Carbide is a major manufacture of some of the most dangerous chemicals that make our modern lives possible. Considering the sheer volume and type of materials they have to deal with it's inevitable they'd be part of so many incidents.
To be fair, you've got to keep this in the mix.
Union Carbide's business model always relied on being a prime technological innovator in working with energetic, toxic, or otherwise hazardous materials. Somebody is necessarily going to be in that position; whoever is, is more or less automatically the poster child for tombstone technology and will become the folks who learn and teach industrial safety the rugged way.
That is life on the bleeding edge, and the second gen will always have a better safety record because they're benefiting from the first gen's hard lessons. (Eventually, some of that second gen become big enough and/or lucky enough to jump on some new tech, and then they become the first gen teaching the lessons, and Tombstone Technology marches on!)
Awesome, thanks for sharing this with me.
The statistics/distances included here blew my mind.
Just the distance that enormous anchor traveled is incredibly terrifying
Probably traveling at mach-i or higher.⚓
Perfect timing! Just wanted to take this moment to say that you're one of the BEST horror channels out there.
i agree its amazing
These are always so good. Whatever I'm doing can wait fifteen minutes.
Horror Channel = reviewing horror movies. This channel is about documenting disasters.
I don't think of this really as a horror channel at all - it's a disaster documentary channel. Some of the early stuff was more horror-esque, talking about crazy murderers and stuff, but evolved to amusement park accidents, then mostly industrial and building disasters. Now more akin to "Seconds from Disaster" but without the sensationalizing BS and more informative.
@@quillmaurer6563 yeah thats fair to say
Dude I have gotten absolutely hooked on your channel. I love the clean professional tone of your delivery, showing great respect to the unfortunate victims while not delving into sobstory territory.
Thank you for presenting this. It is one of those disasters that shows how blind people were to dangers even 70 years ago. I lived in Texas City in the 1980s and spoke with the Pastor emeritus at our church in LaMarque (next door to Texas City and filled with plant workers). He said everyone in the area was personally affected because there wasn't anyone who did not lose a friend or a family member in the disaster. He said he did almost non-stop funerals for weeks. One thing I like about this channel is how it explains what was done in the aftermath and how safety measures changed. The plants in Texas City are still not 100% safe and it seems there is an explosion (not of this magnitude, but felt) about twice a decade. One that happened when I lived there filled the sky with black soot and, once a passing cloud provided rain, all the cars not under roofs were covered in a runny black soot that looked as if a child had fingerpainted every vehicle for miles around. The car washes had a booming business for weeks.
I genuinely appreciate how you translate measurements to suit us Americans. You don't HAVE to do that, but you do and I know that I for one, appreciate the attention to detail...
Also, it must be said that it's refreshing to watch videos without promo plugs in every single one... When you DO feature sponsors it's done in the best way which should be standard across the platform!
All around, you are among the best creators on the platform!
My grandpa was a schoolboy in Galveston when this happened. The windows in his classroom shattered. My great grandfather worked in Texas City on the docks but this happened to be his day off.
I can't believe I've never heard of this. What a terrible tragedy. Thanks for bringing these stories to us all so we can learn from the past.
One of my Air Force roommates lived in Texas City. He remembers family members talking about the disaster. His original family home (built just before WWII) was destroyed in the explosion. No one was killed as the family was up in Galveston for a get together. But the dogs (cared for by a neighbor) were killed by the concussive wave and the neighbor was working at Monsanto and killed in the SS Grandcamp blast. When they got back a week later (the authorities wouldn't let them back in the area until all the fires were out.). They found the neighbors wife and two kids still alive (but inconsolable due to the husband's death.). The wife ended up in a psychiatric institute and the kids went to live with other family members. His family home was in pieces and their dogs had been dead for a week. They recovered what they could and bought some property outside of town to rebuild (as did many residents of Texas City). His dad (a longshoreman and ex-serviceman) got hired (at very good pay) to rebuild the Monsanto plant and eventually retired years later as a production foreman at the plant. The town still had memorial services on the day of the disaster every year when he was living there in the 60's and 70's. The anchor from the SS Grandcamp landed about 2 miles from his house in an open field. He remembers it as part of a memorial park when he'd drive into town later as a teenager to pick his dad from work at the new plant. It was eventually moved to a museum long after he left the city to join the Air Force. He retired from the service and moved somewhere away from Texas City. He doesn't trust chemical factories for some reason.
My mouth was agape for mist of this video. Mostly because the absolute horror of this but also because I’d never heard anything about this before. How’d I miss out on this disaster for so long?
I grew up (in Texas) hearing about this, but never understood the details until now - so thank you. The ammonium nitrate explosion more recently in the town of West, Texas, is worth looking at. Lessons not learned.
Seems likie the Chremical Safety Board (CSB) did a report on the West Texas blast.
You did it! I had requested for you to cover this one and thank you for doing it! My daddy was pretty close to there when this happened. He would take us all around there fishing usually but also showing us kids where all this happened. Thanks again!!
There's another great channel who covers disasters called morbid Midnight yall
I live here, and went through the 2005 explosion while in HS. I'll never forget watching the shockwave ripple through the grass outside our classroom, and the windows bowing in. Can't imagine what THIS explosion was like.
My Sister was in that explosion, she worked at BP , the women in the office was just screaming, she had to take charge and tell them to SHUT UP and evacuate
Watch videos from Beirut to get an idea. A similar amount of ammonium nitrate exploded there.
I remember that day I was the class of 2006 my girlfriend at the time was in the school and I left early to go to work felt the shockwave hit my house as I was getting ready felt like a tanker truck flipped over she told me similar things that happened in school this town sometimes I believe it's cursed
The fact that the anchor went a mile and a half away is scary. That is some insane power. Imagine the 2020 Beirut explosion but a lot stronger.
The Texas City explosion and the 2020 Beirut explosion were similar in size, and both were from the same material (ammonium nitrate).
@@MGW27 I wonder if the explosion looked the same too with how it was just like a massive bubble of smoke from the shockwave consuming everything around it
What do you think what video is next?
Another great video!
I thought maybe you should make a video about 1963 Skopje earthquake... It was very deadly and particularly scary because entire city was built in a highly seismic area with no earthquake proof building standards.
2:15am here in Washington State US. Sending love to whoever reads this. ❤️
5am east coast lmao
❣
❤
❤ right back
4:20 central time 🙌🏻
Back atcha.
That explosion must have been was absolutely terrifying i can't imagine what iit must have been like to be a resident there at the time during the moment ig happened.
My dad was 50 miles away and said his hat blew off his head and you could feel the Earth shake. He would always tear up when he told the story. Just so many people gone
I bet Halifax, Nova Scotia has an idea what it was like
Watch one of those videos of Beirut exlloding and you might get an idea
@@Tom-lm2tc Yeah, I was wondering about that, surely it would be the biggest now?
if you want so see how something like this looks then i will link to two recent incidents that are smaller but still completely unhinged
Tianjin port explosions 2015 (one "small" explosion first then the big one comes right after)
ua-cam.com/video/hUtrkfLKyFE/v-deo.html
beirut port explosion 2020 (looks like a real fucking nuke went off)
ua-cam.com/video/NFjDq-Rsyjo/v-deo.html
the scale of these things are just insane
The Beirut explosion was also caused by improperly stored ammonium nitrate.
Timothy McVeigh used ammonium nitrate when he blew up the Oklahoma Bldg.
Union Carbide: *gets mentioned*
Every single living being on this planet: "Ah shit, here we go again."
Ain't that the truth
True, true, true. The same goes when BP is mentioned as well.
This was extra fascinating to me, because I have never heard of this disaster. This reminds me of the Silvertown explosion, in Newham, London (1917).
Love Tuesdays because of your videos. Tragic disaster very well told. So enjoy your voice, pronunciation and calm delivery. If the title said 'today im going to read cereal boxes' i would still 'like' and listen intently. Thank you for all your good work.
😅😅😅👍👍
Terrific (though horrific) episode K-man!
Reminds me of Halifax, but with more victims, more destruction sadly.
Great work, although I notice you haven’t been including any stories of specific individuals in recent episodes whereas you once did this often??
Regardless, bravo!
Halifax was way worse, 2,000+ people died and several thousand were injured with 10,000’s of buildings severely damaged, the explosion was also around 2.7 kilo tons big
When I heard about the smoke drawing the spectators, I immediately thought of the Halifax Explosion.
@@cranksetwrench oh, well then I stand corrected. One of my favorite FH episodes was the Halifax one. It inspired me to watch atleast a few more videos on the subject. So sad that so many hardworking people were impacted by such an avoidable accident. I guess I misremembered the numbers.
Both are indeed fascinating horror tales for sure!
My grand uncle was there, worked there at the port, survived and wrote a 30 page diary of everything he saw and felt. I got this diary when he died and along with it was several pieces of melted metal from the disaster. He could get back home to Galveston Island and so walked the 61 miles to piney point village on the northwest side of Houston to his sister-in-laws home where he wrote his diary.
Thank you for doing this. I grew up in east Houston, near the ship channel. Every once in a while, the local TV stations would do a documentary on this disaster with some really good quality (for the the 1940s) filming. I haven't lived there in over 30 years, so I have not seen it in a while. Although my parents did not witness it first hand, they made sure we understood that we lived near 37 chemical plants and when you heard the air raid sirens go off, get inside immediately.
Oh my gosh! I've been waiting for this! I live in Texas and I learned about this story from my grandparents, who were young when it happened. In addition to this story, they told me about the New London school explosion, because my grandmother's parents lived near the area when that happened. Thank you for covering this.
Man, ALWAYS the highest caliber content and narration. I absolutely LOVE this channel, and if UA-cam had a platinum level showcase of subscription worthy uploaders, Fascinating Horror would be right up there in the top 5. 💙
Great video, thanks! Even when I'm familiar with an event and seen other creator's videos, you always have details that are new to me and the quality of your productions are fantastic.
My great uncle was the Texas City public health director when this happened. He rarely if ever spoke about it. His wife did tell me what he did. Among the things that he had to do was to catalog the body parts prior to burial in a mass grave. He also had to conduct the coroner inquiries into the disposition of the status of the missing persons. His prior experience in France in Patton's 3rd Army was very effective in getting the injured to hospitals in Galveston and Houston for treatment.
I can understand why he rarely spoke about it. Bless his heart.
Wow.....these older disasters are horrific, but of course fascinating at the same time....RIP!
The idea of a ship exploding, causing fires, only to have a tsunami the explosion caused flood your burning house, is almost comical.
It reminds me of that Mythbusters episode where they tried to test if a water heater exploding in a house fire would put the fire out. I can't remember the results, maybe it did but it destroyed most of what remained of the house in the process. Which I guess is a "success," as a house that isn't there can't be on fire. Same conclusion for a tsunami - probably swept away the houses, so whether or not it put out the fire is a moot point.
Pure definition of a shit-show. It's horrible but absolutely fascinating at the same time how forced can work together to create even more destruction.
that and two ships blowing up of the same thing
I really appreciate you giving standard weights and measurements along with that metric stuff. Thank you! Great videos.
I'd never heard of this!
Wow!
Kind of reminds me of the explosion we had here in NV. Pepcon in Henderson. That's a day I'll never forget, definitely nothing on the scale of death or destruction of Texas City!
Scary as hell! I was living in a high-rise apartment building at the time, I thought a plane went down as it was towards the airport! This was in the 80's when Vegas was still small.
The whole town was freaked out I remember. Especially finding out about rocket fuel being made in our little town. Lol...
Love your channel, great information! ✌
That was a bad ass blast 💥
This disaster is eerily similar to Beirut explosion back in August 4, 2020.
My parents, newlyweds at the time, lived in a garage apartment, some miles away from the harbor.
My mom said that the windows were blown out from the explosion and there was structural damage.
Fortunately, they were out of town the day of the explosion.
Coincidentally, I've just been watching a documentary about the explosion at Beirut docks in 2020. It looks like some lessons are never learned.
Given the proximity of the docks in Beirut to the city centre, and how densely populated the surrounding neighbourhoods are, it's an absolute miracle that the death toll wasn't in the tens of thousands. Ammonium nitrate is nasty, nasty stuff.
Your work remains incredible. I am struck that humanity is resilient and I appreciate your follow-through on the aftermath of the disasters you cover.
Have you done a video yet on the tri-state tornado? A freak tornado that defies category, traveling across three states at 70 mph and leveling everything in its way. Also, you may find some interest in the locust swatms that used to terrorize the US in state-spanning clouds before suddenly going extinct.
This reminds me of the immediate aftermath of the explosion in Halifax. Sir, you did an excellent video on that episode. Thank you for that.
May God comfort those who lost loved ones in this. My sincerest condolences.
My grandfather had been working on the Grandcamp overnight. My great uncle died in the explosion. My grandparents home, about 12 blocks from the pier, had shrapnel in the front door.
"Hey, you know those bags with tons of Ammonia Nitrate we just loaded?"
"Yeah, that super combustible fertilizer?"
"Exactly... they were oddly warm when we loaded them, way warmer than any of the other cargo. Ho hum... when's break?"
"Hey! Several bags of our explosives are on fire!! Should we put it out with water??" "No, you idiot! You'll ruin the rest of the explosives!!"
@@henryturnerjr3857 🤣
Thank you for covering this disaster. You truly have one of the best channels on here.
I grew up in TC. The entire volunteer fire department were all killed in this blast! Ammonium Nitrate is dangerous material if you don’t know what you are doing! I know many many people who lost family members in this catastrophe! God bless these lost souls!
Ooh, I remember suggesting this at some point! Thanks so much for covering it. I learned a lot more than I did when I read about it. This format also really helps show the impact the disaster had.
Amazingly the explosion sounds similar to the Halifax Explosion.
I always find your documentaries to be fascinating. I wanted to especially thank you for using American measurement as well as metric. It is greatly appreciated.
Completely off-topic but I've just realised how much I'd love to watch a Fascinating Horror video of the (entirely fictional) 2007 Mystery Flesh Pit Disaster. It feels like the perfect fit.
That would be a great April Fool’s video! He’s done one for the 1975 Amity Island incident (Jaws) and the 1993 Isla Nublar incident (Jurassic Park) the past two years. I would love to see him go over MFPNP.
@@jacintodiegoobregon6896 Thanks for your comment; I couldn't remember who did the hilarious April Fool's Day "Jaws" story.
Growing up in Houston and taking trips to Galveston multiple times a year, whenever we passed Texas City on the drive down my mom would always say something to the effect of “there’s Texas City, the city that explodes”. She never mentioned these big explosions, so little me just assumed she meant like small little explosions on the daily like in the stuff you can see coming from the processing plants? I’m sure she was thinking of the 2005 explosion, and she doesn’t even know about the 1947 one. I never knew how devastating they actually were, much less that there were 2 of them that day (roughly). Thanks for covering such a wide range of incidents!
I grew up in/near Texas City. My great grandmom told me about the day the disaster happened.
She was in a car driving with her family away from the city because of the fire that was raging at the docks. When the explosion happened, she looked back and saw the sky was filled with tiny specks/shards of what she thought was balsa wood (the wood that lines boat decks). Those shards were actually huge hunks of metal from the hull hurling through the sky, carried by the explosion.
Also, there actually multiple anchors recovered from the ships. One sits at the Texas City Memorial, like is described in the video, but there's also another anchor in the front of the Texas City Museum, found in the older part of town.
I lived in Texas City for a couple years, but this is the first time I've heard the story! I still have family in the area, I'll have to look for the anchor next time I'm visiting.
It might have been worth saying that a molecule of ammonium nitrate contains more than enough oxygen for complete combustion of the substance. So the fire triangle of fuel, oxygen and source of ignition doesn’t apply: ammonium nitrate is both a fuel and a source of oxygen. In fact, ammonium nitrate has excess oxygen, so if it is mixed with fuel, you can have a fire and/or explosion with no air present. Mixtures of ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel have been used as an explosive.
Using firefighting techniques that exclude air, such as battening down the hatches and filling the holds with steam, or using a CO2 extinguisher, don’t have a chance of working on an ammonium nitrate fire.
People might ask why we bother with making ammonium nitrate, if it is so dangerous. The answer is that it is an excellent nitrogenous fertiliser.
Throw sugar at ammonium nitrate to put it out.
@@ClickClack_Bam 9% sugar gives you ANFO…
Ammonium Nitrate also acts as an explosive extender for oxygen poor explosives like TNT giving the same yield as the more expensive pure TNT.
Ammonia is a precursor to making Nitric acid - so making ammonium nitrate is a very simple additional step for nitric acid plants.
@@allangibson2408 Yes, being a chemical engineer I know how to make NH3, HNO3 and NH4NO3.
@@jerry2357 As an industrial engineer, I have also seen sump pump’s rapidly disassemble when water contaminated with Ammonium Nitrate is pumped through them (particularly if the discharge is blocked). Volute temperature sensors are strongly recommended…
Ammonia has its own issues…
I like all your episodes about different disasters throughout history. Fascinating!
My grandpa worked there. He always said it was caused by a sailor who had hobnails on his shoes and sparked when he walked across a catwalk on the ship.
My mother and grandparents lived in Texas City at the time. My mom was showered in glass when the windows blew in at the school, and my grandfather survived only because he was home sick that day from work on the docks. My grandmother was so traumatized by the event, she spoke of it often for the rest of her life.
How do we put out the fire boss?
Make the entire thing into a massive pipe bomb🤔
Thank you so much for sharing these disasters with us. I have never heard of this one. Such a huge tragedy.
Wow that’s insane! Good coverage
I have seen several documentaries, programs, etc over the last 50 yrs of this tragedy. You did a superb job of telling it in a suscinct and stylish manner. I have been to T.C. many times from 1992 to 2008, my in laws lived near there.
When I saw the Texas City Disaster as the title I assumed you were going to discuss the explosion at BP’s refinery in 2005. I’m a traveling refinery and chemical plant instrumentation technician about to start work in Minnesota, so I was like “Oh, that’s a bad omen…” haha
I love the channel. Been subbed for years now. Keep up the amazing stories.
I saw the anchor as a kid on a scout trip to TX City around 1996. A friend and I were able to look into it and give a history story to our troop. We got a merit badge for it and 25 yrs later, a great job because one of the troop leaders remembered me doing that.
I had heard that the one Texas City firefighter that survived didn’t respond to the call, because he was working on his roof. It wasn’t like “he was fortunate to survive”. All I keep wondering is “what went through his mind at the moment of the explosion?”
It’s amazing knowing I’ve worked on the dike, Valero refinery, BP/Marathon refinery, DOW, and the old Textin sites there, and the only way of knowing about this is the little memorials around town.
This was amazing, please keep them coming
Lived in Texas all 20 years of my life and have yet to hear about this. Thanks for the info, it’s much appreciated.
Government not being responsible and having double standards? now that's a surprise...
I wonder if you would be interested in covering the Roseburg Blast that happened in a small town in Oregon, United States, in 1959. A truck loaded with dynamite and ammonium nitrate caught fire and exploded, killing over a dozen and causing destruction over a thirty-block radius. Much like the Grandcamp's anchor, one of the truck's axles was blasted into the air and landed over three blocks away. One of the worst disasters in Oregon history.
Thank you for another great video, and for the wonderful work you do in general. I've really been enjoying your channel over the past couple of years and hope to enjoy it for many more.
If you are from FARM COUNTRY, the words "ammonium nitrate" and "ammunition" should never be in the same sentence, let alone the same ship.. This is a lesson the people of Beirut, Lebanon just had to re-learn
My husband was born and raised near there and we live close to it. It was so sad learning about this from him!
I love seeing the historical photographs
Nearing 1 million subs! Well deserved! I wonder if there'll be a special of some kind for the occasion lol
I always love the content you make. Keep up the great work!
I love your videos. They're always very informative, always entertaining, and the music should never be changed
This is the third disaster with ammonium nitrate that I know of. The same stuff that destroyed the port of Beirut in 2020... How many times will history repeat itself?!
It's also what made up the makeshift car bomb in the Oklahoma City bombing. The stuff is common, cheap, and essential for agriculture, so this will keep happening for a very long time.
I'm finding these stories so sad but they're fascinating. I'm wondering if those who make them would do a story on the Hazelwood coal fire mine, in country Victoria in 2014. This fire was huge and went for weeks, affecting thousands of nearby residents with toxic fumes and ash.
The storage of Ammonium Nitrate is still largely unregulated. A disaster like this is very likely to happen in the U.S. again.
Not surprised, seeing as many safety and environmental regulations have been cut down for the past few years in the US.
Maybe in other countries but now OSHA is VERY clear on how these products have to be stored. Thats not to say those warnings are always heeded
I’m thinking after Beirut this is back in the forefront of people’s minds. The world unfortunately needs a reminder every few decades to reinforce the fact that AN is dangerous stuff.
Because only profits matter when your industry is protected from accountability .
@@Battlefox64_RL I happened again in West, Texas.
"fire and explosion at the West Fertilizer Co. on April 17, 2013, in the rural town of West.
The explosion flattened the farming community of 2,800 people, just north of Waco, turning some 500 homes into rubble as residents tried desperately to flee the horrific scene. Over 200 people were injured.
Another great video. Thanks Fascinating Horror for hitting that sweet spot between sensationalism (or lack therof) and interesting narration.
British narrators just hit different on spooky content. None of that Burger King foot lettuce, please
it's not spooky, it's tragic.