watching the things happening with Facebook these days conjures a certain scene in my head.
I'm standing on the shore in Texas City and watching smoke rise from the SS Grandcamp, noticing the seawater beginning to boil as it comes in contact with the lower hull. I have already left the docks, for fear of them catching fire, and am now watching the trouble from a safe distance.
I ask someone what the cargo is - 2000 tons of ammonium nitrate.
Oh.
I am not far enough away.
the Texas City disaster killed almost everyone within sight of the Grandcamp, including all but one member of the fire department. It leveled almost a thousand buildings, and knocked two airplanes out of the sky. Lots of people who assumed they were at a safe distance - it was just a ship on fire, no threat to the shore, right? - were well within the range of instant death.
I'm not far enough away to be safe during what's about to happen with Facebook.
@diodelass I hadn't heard of the 1947 Texas City disaster, but I had heard of the 1917 one in Halifax, which was pretty similar: Ship in port catches fire, people gawk, and then the 3 kiloton-TNT-equivalent cargo explodes and levels the town. (Largest pre-nuclear explosion, in this case.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Explosion
Every year, Halifax gives Boston a big Christmas tree as thank you for the latter's aid during the aftermath.
@diodelass The story is pretty infuriating; two ships in a narrow channel failed to negotiate basic collision avoidance. Both were found negligent.
...but tooting "fuck you" to another ship that has asked you to change course repeatedly, while trying to speed out of the channel? Not a particularly wise move, although dunno how accurate the Wikipedia account is.
I'm kind of interested in looking up a root-causes analysis of that accident now.
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