tuning in every week for your dose of random videos I have instagram so check that out if you want to see random pictures I also have twitter and if you're enjoying this outro song please feel free to check out my second channel made by john and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and mr music play us out please everyone wonder what happens here you can find out on my instagram which is plainly.john or my second youtube channel which is made by john now without further ado let's get on to this week's video it is just before lunch on wednesday the 10th of october 2012 an crane is lifting a concrete beam in a car park building site in miami florida just as the beam reaches the sixth floor the northeast portion of the garage the events became yet another chapter in building blunders involving concrete in the state my name is john and welcome to plainly difficult and today we're looking at the miami dade car park collapse background well in case you're thinking this is a re upload it's not there are far too many for comfort building collapses in the state of florida concrete and florida seem to go together like radio isotopes and scrap merchants we're back once again to the sunny state of florida and what feels like groundhog day a concrete building collapse but not only just a collapse it is a collapse to do with a collie which rings deja vu for the florida international university incident and not only that but this event is not the only concrete structure collapse at this college in particular our story starts just over a year before the collapse in july 2011 with the signing of the contract for a new multi-story car park at miami dade college the board of trustees had awarded a guaranteed maximum price design build contract to ajax building corporation the project had a price of $25 million it was planned to be a six-story precast concrete structure with precast columns, beams double T's and wall panels the contract with Ajax building corporation would have two parts the first being the design and architectural services in which the company would undertake all the relevant building and site surveys the second part would be the demolition of an already standing warehouse and the actual construction of the new multi-story parking garage for the second part of the project Ajax contracted mar contracting incorporated of miami florida to design, fabricate and install all the concrete sections nothing unusual but mar then went on to contract out the work to a couple of other companies corse lab structured miami incorporated for the design and fabrication of the concrete but they too also subcontracted some of the work in this case for design resulting engineering group corse lab would still do the fabrication however for installation mar subbed out the work for erection to solo erectors and for the final grout and wash florida lee mark corporation of Doral would be used I'm not going to lie this is a little bit confusing to say the least well regardless of the rather complex contracting arrangements let's look at the design of this shiny new car park okay well I know multi-story parking lots are hardly the most exciting of buildings but they are very important nonetheless the garage was to make use of precast beams footed on on-site cast bases with integral corbels for supporting the floors the footings would be 5 foot deep and attached to the columns via bolts the floors would consist of double tees running north south supported by either a single tee or a spandrel precast member running east to west the inverted and double tees were welded together along with the spandrel beams and the inverted tees were then welded to the columns these columns were in two sizes 24 and 42 inches wide the larger being in the middle of the building below the second story the columns did have reinforcement but only made of mild steel each levels column was cast as two separate pieces which during construction would be bolted together however this left a two inch gap which then had to be filled with a high strength grout the lateral load resistance system employed at the car park was precast shear walls part of the load calculations involved predicted wind conditions for the area but the construction although not glamorous and on the face of it a simple project I know it really wasn't the car park construction was not without its shall we say incidents on the 8th of October 2012 as one of the shear panels was being lifted by one of the onsite cranes the boom arm struck the top of column B2 the cause lab engineer inspected the column from the ground and not seeing any obvious damage allowed construction to continue although no apparent damage to the column could be seen the boom arm had a pretty substantial dent in it now I know you can't really inspect it properly from the ground but regardless no x-ray of the column or even up close viewing was undertaken well it was to no one's surprise that when the next day on the 9th of October that this column was now 3 quarter of an inch out of plumb in layman's terms was now cockeyed but what to do well use a few shims and wedges to coax it back in line again and this is what would happen on the morning of the 10th of October when some double and inverted T's were installed but again this column was not properly inspected by now though disaster was just a few hours away the disaster it is the 10th of October 2012 and work is underway on the 6th level of the Miami-Dade car park at roughly 25 past 11 in the morning the on-site crane was preparing to lift a pre-car spandrel up to the 6th floor it reached the top but just before it could be lowered to its final resting place at 11.30 am the structure of the car park suddenly and dramatically collapsed columns from A2 to C5 had collapsed all the double T's between the 6th floor and the 2nd floor pancake on top of one another an entire quarter of the total building had collapsed weighing in at roughly 3,000 tons and sadly anything or anyone inside was pulverized two employees of solar erectors incorporated one employee of E&E concrete pumping services incorporated and one employee of Striker Electric incorporated were inside one would be rescued only to succumb to their injuries in hospital a day later after several days of combing the wreckage sites the focus shift from rescue to recovery to eventually investigation the investigation investigators would start dissecting the disaster site just one day after the collapse these were two structural engineers from OSHA's directorate of construction they would be looking at potential causes on the site for two weeks in addition to this another engineer attended to interview all the major stakeholders in the project the investigation would delve into every aspect of the project including construction documents specifications shop drawings and contractual papers as well as photos and videos all of which were taken at the incident site and at the storage yard where the fallen major structural members for examination when they started looking at the supporting columns they found some worrying signs of poor workmanship several splices where the two precast sections of each column were connected together were lacking sufficient ground some of the columns even had no ground at their base most notable was column B3 and A3 this should have been picked up on the daily inspections even more worryingly inspections of the higher sections of the structure were done from the ground sometimes as far as 40 feet away which clearly is not good enough 18 columns were missing any kind of reported grout inspection and when questioned the main inspector was unaware of the need to check which is rather concerning so it was quickly found out about the lack of grouting on the splices and the column bases was likely to cause a collapse OSHA found in their report that some sections were not supported on the day of the collapse and when combined with the lack of grouted joints on at least two columns this severely reduced the structure's reliability they said in their report as loads on the column gradually increased on the day of the collapse the bearing of the column over the shin plates exceeded its capacity resulting in failure this triggered a cascade of collapse of columns inverted T beams and double T's on all five floors weighing approximately 3,300 tons over an area of approximately 16,000 square feet OSHA found five of the companies working on site $38,000 each for their incompetence and a further $32,000 was charged to four of the companies an undisclosed amount was paid as a settlement to the families of four workers who became victims but this wasn't the last disaster linked to this car park on the 15th of April 2016 a beam fell off a construction crane causing a concrete plate to come crashing down on the third floor of the structure injuring three workers so it's now time for my rating it's got to be negligent purely on the fact that the correct inspections were never undertaken however the car park project as a whole has to be considered a dumpster fire and on my legacy scale I'm going to give it a number four this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are creative commons attribution share alike licensed plain difficult videos are produced by me John and they're currently wet and windy corner of southern London UK I have Patreon and YouTube members so thank you very much for your financial support there's a recipe for tuning in every week I've got Twitter and Instagram and also a second channel which is where you can listen to this outro song in full and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and Mr Music Man play us out please it is the closing minutes of an April in 1970 evening in California and two men are being pulled over in their red Pontiac along the Old Road and Henry Mayo Drive in Valencia, California the traffic stop is in connection with an earlier road rage incident what would be considered a misdemeanor offence but this pull over would result in one of the bloodiest days in California law enforcement history and in just five minutes four people would be dead today I'm covering the new hall incident and welcome to plainly difficult two men our story starts with two men renting an apartment in Long Beach, California nothing out of the ordinary friends share apartments to keep down the cost of living but these two men had met somewhere slightly different than most prison these two new flatmates were Jack Wright Twinning and Bobby Augusta Davis both had been in and out of prison for most of their lives after their original meeting in prison the duo met up in Houston, Texas and set out for California the year was 1969 and both men had failed to re-enter society with jobs and as such they sought out to continue their life of crime a half an hour drive away from their apartment in Long Beach was Santa Anita Park the two men whilst there had noticed an armored money car these seemingly tough targets filled with thousands of dollars were to these two at least attempting juicy target but how to successfully defeat such a vehicle well the two men had seen something on their journey to California a construction site that had been using explosives to clear land Twinning and Davis thought that if they had explosives then they would be able to blow the doors off the armored car and get that sweet sweet cash inside you know as I write this this kind of makes me think that they had actually got the idea from the Italian job anyways the two set out on the 5th of April 1970 to procure some explosives Davis dropped off Twinning to make his way to the construction site and Davis would meet him later on the car the two had was a red 1964 Pontiac Grand Prix and oh boy this vehicle was loaded up with some guns the two men had a Smith & Wesson Model 39 9mm semiautomatic pistol a 6 inch culked python 357 magnum revolver two snub-nosed CULT Detective Special 38 caliber revolvers a Model 1903 Springfield bolt action a Sawanoff 12 gauge shotgun a Remington Model 5 72.22 caliber pump action rifle and a 44 magnum ruger Model 44 semiautomatic carbine now later on in the evening Davis would set off the chain of events that would result in a lot of deaths and his own incarceration when driving along interstate 5 Davis decided to do an illegal U-turn this involved him crossing across the highway medium pretty dodgy but the manoeuvre also nearly caused a crash with another car driven by Ivory Jack Tidewell with his wife Viola Bernice White as a passenger some horn honking and arguing between the two drivers ensued which resulted in both cars coming to a stop on the highway an argument broke out between the two drivers Davis pulled out a gun and threatened Tidewell thinking on his feet the innocent motorist convinced Davis that the police were in the area and the armed assailant fled in his car Tidewell and his wife then immediately drove to near his phone box to report the incident in doing so giving the description of the crazy driver and his car this incident happened at roughly 11 20 in the evening and the call was put out to all California highway patrol vehicles in the area to pull over a red Pontiac to discuss the dangerous driving and gun wieldiness of its driver at some point over the next 20 minutes or so Davis had collected twinning and the two continued their drive which would enroll passing a CHP patrol car manned by officers Frago and Roger Gore they lit up the lights and followed the red Pontiac it pulled off the freeway at the exit for Henry Mayo Drive after which it pulled into a car park next to a J's coffee shop adjacent to a standard gas station twinning and Davis at this point decided that they were not going to submit to the police and try their luck shooting their way out the two officers followed in a 1969 Dodge Parola patrol car two more officers in another patrol car were not far away and were ready to jump in if back up was needed clearly officers Frago and Roger Gore were not prepared for what was about to unfold as they pulled in behind that red Pontiac the shootout the police car pulled up to the rear of the Pontiac and the officers used their car as a cover the officers used the spotlight on their car to light up the suspects illuminating Davis and twinning the order to leave the vehicle with their hands up was shouted three times Davis the driver complied he got out of the Pontiac and after another order to raise his arms from Gore put both arms in the air the next order was to spread his legs and put his hands on the car's rear fender Davis also did this with one suspect seemingly compliant and Frago with his shotgun raised in the air with the stock of his hip approached twinning he was still in the passenger seat and their passenger door was still closed as Frago went to open the door twinning flung open the car door with a revolver in his hand Frago shouted hold it and load the shotgun but twinning had the drop and fatally shot Officer Frago as soon as Officer Frago hit the floor twinning jumped out of the passenger seat and started shooting at Gore across the rear of the Pontiac Gore turned and shot back missing twinning hitting the Pontiac and a Mustang parked near the coffee shop Davis used this distraction to pull a two inch revolver from his belt in an instant he fired two shots almost point blank at Gore killing him instantly two officers were now dead Officer James Pence and George Allen pulled up in their dodge patrol car alongside Gore and Frago's vehicle as soon as the car stopped both officers were met with gunfire from both assailants the revolvers both Davis and twinning had were now out of ammo and retreated back to their car to retrieve some more of the guns that they had Davis grabbed out a sawn off 12 gauge shotgun twinning pulled out a 1911 pistol twinning fired one shot from this but it jammed he discarded it and grabbed another from the car Pence and Allen radioed into CHP that shots had been fired and officers were down Allen emerged and moved to the right hand side of the two patrol cars and emptied his Remington model 870 shotgun at the Pontiac he then retreated back behind and in between the patrol cars he pulled his service revolver and emptied it into the suspect's car out of this volley only a superficial wound was received by twinning Davis returned fire with his shotgun fatally killing Allen he then made his way back to the Pontiac picked up Frago shotgun and after trying to operate it accidentally discharged it into the air this was then discarded and Davis took the downed officers service revolver now every story needs a mad lad and this would come from a passerby Gary Dean Ness H31 and a former US Marine he saw the gunfight between the CHP and the suspects after Allen was downed running away Ness thought I'll have some of that and charged him behind the patrol cars in an attempt to drag Allen's body to safety Ness upon not being able to drag Allen picked up the CHP shotgun and tried to return fire at Davis but Ness was unaware the shotgun was empty next Ness under fire from Davis took Allen's revolver and fired a single shot lodging a fragment into Davis's chest the revolver now too was empty meanwhile officer Pence's revolver was also empty he knelt down to reload behind his patrol car twinning flanked him by running out from behind the left side of the Pontiac firing four shots at the officer hitting Pence in the chest and in both legs sending him to the ground Pence on the ground was still frantically trying to reload his revolver at the time officers were not issued with quick reloaders and as such he had to load one round at a time in the absolute pain and confusion of the situation Pence didn't notice twinning approaching at point blank he said I've got you now and fired two shots into the back of Pence's head seeing this Ness retreated and sought cover in a ditch a third police car approached the scene and Ness ran up to the vehicle the car was carrying sergeant Harry Ingold and officers Roger Palmer Ed Holmes and Richard Robinson more firing erupted and twinning and Davis fled into the night taking with them several guns and dispersed into two different directions meanwhile the police scoured the area for the two and began to piece together the shootout the empty Pontiac was approached and searched but both men had slipped away into the night but our story isn't over yet Davis stumbled about in the night and at roughly 3.25am came across a camper parked up with 40 old Daniel James Schwartz inside a gunfight ensued between Schwartz and Davis with Schwartz firing his Lee Enfield rifle both men ran out of bullets and Davis overpowered Schwartz hitting him with his pistol with the owner subdued Davis fled in the camper sometime later Schwartz managed to report the theft to the police a couple of hours later he was pulled over and Davis now out of ammunition surrendered to the police he was claiming he was a hitchhiker that had only stolen the camper and was in fact just an innocent bystander to the police slaying earlier on in the evening stating he was just a passenger not the driver of the Pontiac but this was obviously all rubbish but we'll come back to him in a little bit now twinning was still on the loose the hostage twinning fled the scene across US-99 and covered roughly 3 miles eventually reaching Lyons Avenue he broke into the house of Glen S. Hoag and in the chaos twinning took Glen hostage but his wife and son thankfully escaped alerting the police in doing so this was around 4.30am police quickly surrounded the house and a standoff ensued a police negotiator would chat to the suspect over the telephone and during the conversations he would brag about the death of Frego by saying his mistake was carrying his gun at port he got careless so I wasted him the police issued an ultimatum at 9am twinning released his hostage and tear gas was thrown into the house as the police entered a single shotgun blast rang out the suspect had taken the easy way out aftermath so back to Davis as the use of a chocolate teapot and it was quickly found out that he was one of the two men who committed the massacre he was convicted and sentenced to death for the murders of the forcing HP officers but luckily or not Davis' sentence was commuted to life in prison without parole this was after the US Supreme Court ruling on Thurman vs Georgia where the death penalty was deemed unconstitutional he would last until the 16th of August 2009 when he would also take the easy way out the shootout would be dissected as to how four police were killed in just 5 minutes well there was one startling similarity all men had under 2 years service and all were between the ages of 23 and 24 none had ballistic vests but although not standard issue 3 of the men would have likely survived their wounds if they had been issued them speed of reloading was also an issue as well as their pistols being different from which they had been trained on as a result the CHP standardised their weaponry and training the event would help push forward better training procedures in police stops especially when dealing with armed individuals and as such I'm going to give this tragedy a legacy rating of a 7 this is a plaintiff court production all videos on the channel are creative commons attribution share a license plaintiff for videos are produced by me John in the currently actually sunny corner southern London UK I'd like to thank my Patrons and YouTube members for your financial support and the rest of you for tuning in every week to watch your weekly dose of me talking I have a second channel called made by John I also have an Instagram and Twitter if you want to see other random pictures I put out and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and Mr Music play us out please it is the evening of the 13th of July 1977 and a thunderstorm is forming over New York City lightning can be seen flashing near the Hudson river it strikes the Buchanan south substation and two circuit breakers are tripped as consolidated Edison scrambled to fix the issue the lightning strike would be the first in a number of unlikely strikes that would ultimately result in 1.5 billion in today's dollars worth of damage over 3,700 people arrested for rioting and looting and a cultural landmark that would shape, destitute city and even some of the music we listen to of course today I'm looking at the 1977 New York City blackout my name is John and welcome to plainly difficult New York New Broke so the 1970s weren't a particularly great time financially for the city of New York by 1975 the city was close to defaulting on its debts and was in a financial crisis crime was on the rise and the middle classes had fled to the suburbs hitting the city's tax income the deficit was at at least 600 million but it was a bit of an open secret that was just a tip of a much bigger financial iceberg others have covered this period greater in detail so I won't dive any deeper apart from New York was short on cash and this lack of funds spilled out into the streets the city was in decay and the average person on the street knew it subways dilapidated police overworked the streets dirty and all of this played into a general lack of pride in the city I mean who could blame them if the authorities didn't care then why should we and this would create fertile ground a disaster that would unfold a storm in the city it is the evening of the 13th of July 1977 and the Indian Point nuclear power station is supplying households via power lines and substations throughout New York State and the city one of these substations is at Buchanan south Westchester County it is tasked with converting the high voltage some 144,000 volts of electricity from the power station down to a more usable commercial voltage the substation mostly sends electricity off to New York City this relatively normal but humid and warm July evening gave way to lightning it lit up the sky lightning bolts reached out to the ground and one of its targets was the Buchanan south substation at roughly 9.17 in the evening the strike blew out two circuit breakers these didn't reclose as they were meant to obviously this is not good but not terrible lightning can't strike twice right well in today's story also no but probably worse for New York the lightning struck something else a power line this was two 345 kilovolt transmission lines one reclosed but the other didn't this resulted in two other lines becoming overloaded the load was rather high due to people using air con in the july heat a fast start generator was attempted to be brought online but remote starting failed if that wasn't bad enough another lightning strike hit the sprain brook substation in yonkers this also took out two more lines of which only one once again restarted this yet again increased the load on other infrastructure it was ever becoming apparent that connedison needed to load shed initially a 5% power reduction followed by an 8% reduction at 9.19pm took place another substation trips due to the thermal overload but by 24 minutes past 9 this was not working and the system was still very much overloaded the city's own power plants couldn't pick up the slack and with supplemental power lines also overwhelmed it was just a matter of time ravens wood number 3 also known as big alice capable of supplying 990 megawatts shut down taking with it the lights of new york city and this was around half nine in the evening desperately connedison operators tried to restore power but this wouldn't be for quite a while darkness legadia and kennedy airports had to be shut down streetlights were out tunnels were shut the subway ground to a halt an alarm security system stopped working at shea stadium the Mets were playing the cups and losing the game in the sixth inning this too was plunged into darkness many trying to return home from the city were now stranded with very few trains running the only lights were from cars and the odd buildings that had backup generators however the darkness was ripe for being exploited for crime most shop owners had closed up and gone home consequently leaving their juicy stock unprotected gangs made their way out onto the streets attacking passers by and many regular people took the opportunity to loot and smash up their local shops throughout the night many would take to lighting kerosene burners candles small bonfires cars shops and houses in all over 1,000 cases of arson would be logged looting range from local convenience stores to over 40 brand new cars being stolen from a car dealership other cars were jacked in the traffic to be used as battering rams for more protected shop runs as the night dragged on emergency services quickly became overwhelmed crown heights and bushwick were hit really hard with tens of stores smashed up in just a few blocks but vandalism muggings and arson hit across the city at approximately 31 neighborhoods two blocks of broadway in brooklyn were ablaze and during the carnage 550 police officers were injured in the mayhem and well over 37 100 were arrested looting ran all the way into the morning and the day of the 14th of july in all the blackout would last 25 hours and a total of 300 million of 1977 dollars nearly 1.5 billion today worth of damage was inflicted on the city on top of that there was one murder with the shooting of dominic kisscone in carol gardens of which the crime is still unsolved till this very day the first area to get power back was queens at 7am on the 14th but why was the 1977 blackout so crime filled especially when compared with the blackout a decade earlier which was held up as example of communities coming together well it was probably the economic situation in the city in the late 1970s that bred disdain amongst its inhabitants who saw the blackout as an opportunity to get some stuff they couldn't afford even if it was at the expense of the very communities in which they lived the spark so to speak that caused the fire the original substation at Buchanan which failed to reclose its circuit breakers was due to an incorrectly fastened locknut that was missed likely due to cutbacks on maintenance throughout a decade of financial issues of course there's more to it as even the overloaded lines were a sign of improper planning for such an event con Edison would investigate the cause and implement improved practices and infrastructure strengthening may a beam would blame con Edison calling the event gross negligence but beam would take on someone to heat himself and leave office the same year interestingly in 2019 on the 42nd anniversary of the blackout con Edison treated west Manhattan's inhabitants to a re-enactment to 73,000 people how nice of them the blackout would inspire a number of musicians both directly and indirectly hometown hero David Bowie's song blackout has been linked to the event although Bowie himself never really gave a definitive answer he would say I can't in all honestly say that it was the NY one though it is entirely likely that the image locked itself inside my head so buying this CD for b-roll might have been a bit of a waste so the disaster scale I'm going to give it a bad day at the office or possibly dumpster fire due to the amount of arson and the legacy scale is going to be a number 8 we said Plain Difficult Production all videos on the next channel are creative commons attribution, share or light licence Plain Difficult Videos are produced by me John and are currently quite pleasant corner of southern London UK I have Patrons and YouTube members so I'd like to thank you for your financial support as well as the rest of you for tuning in every week for your dose of me talking I have Instagram and Twitter and if you're enjoying this outro song then please feel free to head on over to my second channel made by John where you can listen to it in full and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and Mr Music Man play us out Polly it is the 14th of December 1994 and the Iowa Morning Darkness is about to be interrupted at approximately 6 minutes past 6 in the morning the Terra International Incorporated Virtualizer Facility is consumed by an explosion today's video will look at how this turned into this my name is John and welcome to plainly difficult a brief history of Terra at Port Neil our story starts in 1965 here in Port Neil Woodbury County in the US state of Iowa a new fertilizer plant is under construction it's planned to supply farms within a 200 mile radius with their ammonia and other nitrogen crop chemicals shipping of the products was mainly undertaken by road with only about a third by rail understandable due to the local nature of the business the plant had two major areas area one consisted of an ammonia plant tank farm and utilities with area two being home to a nitric acid plant urea plant and ammonium nitrate plant so the whole goal of the site was to create ammonium nitrate urea to make this the plant needed all of the other parts of the site to produce their respective ingredients once enough nitrate ammonia and urea are produced ammonium nitrate can be made so let's look at the process used on the Terra Industries site so the whole goal of the site was to create ammonium nitrate urea ammonium nitrate for this was produced not surprisingly at the ammonium nitrate plant in area two the process took 55 and 56% nitric acid and ammonia and reacted it inside a thing called a neutralizer the nitric acid came from the plant in area one and the ammonia came from the urea plants on site but could be assisted by any of the four tanks varying from 30,000 us gallons to 5 million us gallons it was introduced at the bottom of the neutralizer the flow of ammonia was determined by the site's production capacity nitric acid was dispersed a bit above the ammonia the reaction is very exothermic which allows water to be evaporated out of the neutralizer creating the required 83% ammonium nitrate temperature is monitored via probe in the upper part of the unit the temperature maintained in the neutralizer was around 267 degrees fahrenheit or roughly 130 degrees centigrade the neutralizer was constructed of stainless steel the juicy ammonium nitrate overflowed off the neutralizer into a rundown tank this acted as a surge vessel for the neutralizer before the ammonium nitrate is pumped to the storage tank farm the rundown tank was insulated with 2 inches of calcium silicate water vapor was vented to atmosphere via a scrubber where any ammonium nitrate solution was returned to the neutralizer in 1992 the site received an upgrade in the form of a new computer control distribution control system this would increase production from 800 tons per day to over 1000 tons per day it was also able to monitor and record data it can also alert operators to process variable deviations and even automatically control output and this leads us to 1994 and a disastrous series of events the disaster it is the 27th of November 1994 and the ammonium nitrate plant has encountered a problem a pH probe on the neutralizer's downline was found to be defective no replacement is available and the decision is made to continue working with the defective probe just a week later on the 5th of December a leak was discovered a surface condenser in the nitric acid plant had been leaking and this required the shutdown of this part of the site although apparently getting fixed a couple of days later the plant would be shut down once again meanwhile at roughly 10pm on the 11th of December at the ammonium nitrate plant the outside operator found the neutralizer to be operating in highly acidic conditions the discovery was found during a grab sample and the pH was minus 1.5 the fumes were so strong that their operator's face became burnt another operator was called in and managed to monitor the neutralizer's acid levels reduced eventually reaching normal levels at around 1am on the 12th of December just an hour later a leak was discovered on the condense site line from the neutralizer to the scrubber the north pump was shut down and the south pump was started only for that one to also leak the gaskets for the north pump were replaced and it was returned to work but an unknown amount of ammonium nitrate had leaked the nitric acid plant would for another time switch off acid supply with an emergency shutdown again on the 12th of December the less than regular supply of acid over the first week of December had caused production issues and by early afternoon on the 12th the ammonium nitrate plant would be forced to start shutting down production shut down started at around 2pm with the neutralizer being switched off at 3pm the nitric acid line was purged with air and the product pumps were shut down and blocked off the air pushed the nitric acid into the neutralizer this was roughly 220 US gallons in total the purging of the lines took until 8.30pm after this 200 PSIG steam was applied to the nitric acid line this was to stop freezing in the December night but what the operators didn't know was that the neutralizer was in a highly acidic and contaminated condition caused by the leaks over the previous days but little did the operators know that injecting the high pressure steam into the neutralizer would result in a potentially runaway thermal reaction the ammonium nitrate was now sensitized and was a ticking time bomb the scrubber was still working and with the recirculating pumps on was blowing down ammonium nitrate back into the neutralizer but the early hours of the morning of the 13th of December the plant was shut down and upon vision inspection by one of the operators apparently no issues could be seen start up was planned for later on in the morning and as such at 6am the nitric acid air compressor was being started up but just 6 minutes later two explosions erupted from the neutralizer the explosion destroyed the neutralizer replacing it with a crater four would lose their lives in the disaster almost instantly with another 18 being seriously injured debris was littered over a 500 yard radius with a blast being heard nearly 30 miles away some of the debris had damaged the on-site nitric acid tanks spinning liquid onto the ground no building on site escaped damage and windows on nearby houses were broken the explosion damaged ammonia gas storage tanks on site causing a release of the chemical into the air as the gas spread some 3000 residents would be required to temporarily evacuate contaminants floated around the plant for 6 days causing horrendous local health scares to add a cherry to the feces pie a power station across the Missouri river also took damage reducing power to the local community the total cost of the disaster would be estimated at $300 million but as the human and societal cost became apparent the cause needed to be investigated enter the EPA the investigation so almost immediately after one of the country's biggest fertilizer plants self-immolated the EPA got stuck into investigation they looked over the disaster site and interviewed any witnesses they could find as they constructed the timeline the cause became ever so apparent no surprises it involved incompetence and improper plant operation they found the training of operators to be lackluster to say the least there was little in the way of safe operating procedures and to make things worse communications between the various plants on site was pretty much useless the human factors created the environment full of disaster but how did the explosion start? well the neutralizer was allowed to reach a dangerously acidic level which was caused by the purging of the acid line after the acid plant couldn't supply the ammonium nitrate plant this isn't the end of the world so long as it's properly monitored and has it's pH level adjusted accordingly but this wasn't done steam was applied to the neutralizer to keep it from freezing this in combination with the compressed air used to purge the nitric acid created low density zones i.e. bubbles these zones load the amount of energy required to initiate thermal decomposition of the ammonium nitrate this occurred for 15 hours before the explosion creating localized areas of heating which couldn't be diffused through the rest of the ammonium nitrate the ammonium nitrate had also been contaminated with chlorides during various leaks this also reduced the energy needed for activation all of this destabilized the ammonium nitrate in the neutralizer and the slow roll of pumps during the planned start up added more super heated steam and basically became the ignition point the EPA concluded that the main cause was sheer lack of safe operating procedures any procedures that were actually used were rather worryingly never written down so obviously this was a recipe for disaster so i'm going to rate this disaster as a bad day at the office and a 6 on the legacy scale do you agree? let me know in the comments below this is a plainly difficult production all videos on the channel are creative commons at tuition share like licensed plainly difficult videos are produced by me john in the currently quite nice sunny corner of southern london uk i have instagram and twitter so check them out if you fancy looking at some random pictures and i'd also like to make a very warm thank you to my patreons and youtube members as well as the rest of you who tune in every week to see my videos if you're enjoying this outro song then please go over to my second channel made by john where you can listen to and watch the video in full all that's left to say is thank you for watching and mr music man plays out please maglev the supposed transport of the future it is an impressive concept high speeds along frictionless track the only concern is wind resistance i'll be honest i love the concept but i do think of it as a bit of a gadget bar you may be wondering why is john giving me his opinion on a semi-futuristic mode of public transport well because no one else will listen to me at home they get a bit bored when i wax lyrical about trains can i talk to you about railways well it leads me neatly onto today's subject which shows that future trains are just as susceptible to bulls ups as their more traditional counterparts the usual suspects will come out to play regulations ignorance and complacency today we're looking at the trans rapid latin train collision maglev oh maglev so i'm not going to go too deep of a dive into the world of magnetic levitation i always read this as magical levitation and i know my brain is broken maglevs have been the brain residue of many an engineer and inventor dating back to the early years of the last century with this first patent filed in 1902 maglevs have a lot of the usual madcap train replacement tropes expensive complex tracks usually raised in the air and completely incompatible with conventional trains just like my personal favourite crazy train invention the bennie rail plane many nations dip their toes into the world of maglev some better than others but for today's video let's look at just one country that worked with maglevs germany so maglevs run along a guide way rather than a physically rolling on a track like trains and monorails do but unlike other guideway type transport systems like a guided bus no part of the train actually makes contact with the guideway now now now before you shout at the screen i know some systems do have little support wheels that pop out of the train when travelling at low speed but you know let's just ignore that for today anyway so how does the train not make contact with the guideway well by floating through the power of magnets you see how two magnets of the same pole push each other away well this can be harnessed to create frictionless travel this is where electromagnetic suspension comes into the whole equation it creates magnetic levitation by the power of electromagnets and by constantly altering the strength of the magnet field produced by using a feedback loop ok i know i've butchered that explanation but john's tldr is magnets make future floaty train go brrr so with no friction between train and guideway how does it drag itself along well that comes in with linear induction motors basically imagine electric motor with a rotor and a stator but rolled out flat instead of creating torque it produces a linear force this reduces moving parts to practically zero as such increases efficiency and reliability as well as speed which is maglev's biggest benefit they really can go so that was my brief summary of maglev let's focus in on germany in particular and our disaster area emsland test facility so as i mentioned earlier one of the countries that went in on maglev was germany roughly around the same sort of time as the intercity express project the main player in the german maglev scene was trans rapid they began with an inside mock-up model in 1969 called trans rapid number one so over the following decade the concept was developed into a fully working passenger carrying prototype by the end of the 1970s in 1979 trans rapid 5 ran during the munich transport exhibition it carried over its few weeks roughly 50,000 people this generated enough interest to warrant a full blown test track the site was selected in latem emsland and the construction was began in 1980 the track was completed by 1984 and it was a pretty impressive project in total the track length was 31.5 kilometers or 19 miles and featured two turning curves and a straight bit of lion roughly 12 kilometers or 7.5 miles long for achieving high speed operation there was a depot which had a switch to allow trains in and another two switches at each curve and just one station the system looked remarkably like a monorail with its concrete beam and was elevated along the land below to be used for farming over the years since opening operational speeds gradually increased as the system was refined from trans rapid number 6 all the way to number 8 in 1999 and boasted speeds up to 420 kilometers an hour or 260 miles an hour although the track and trains were solely used for testing members of the public are allowed to ride the trains for a small fee trans rapid 8 was a free car unit the rear of which was always kitted out with monitoring equipment putting passengers in the front two cars it proved vital for building data about operating a maglev train the system didn't really receive a widespread roll out apart from the Shanghai maglev which is kind of cool the line at the test track was a single vehicle only operation which meant signaling wasn't too much of a big deal instead relying on radio communications for train movement authorities but the maglevs weren't the only vehicles permitted on the line there was also a non levitating vehicle used for track clearance and maintenance this ran on tyres and was powered by a diesel engine every day an engineering vehicle drives the test track to clear it of debris and on the 22nd of September 2006 this was no different the collision it is the early morning of the 22nd of September 2006 and a 60 metric ton 10 meter or 33 feet long maintenance vehicle makes its way out of the depot building on to the test track two workers are aboard and they go about their usual business checking the track for the morning's test runs the vehicle has one driver's cab at one end with his engine at the other meanwhile the 31 passengers for the first test train of the day are congregating in the visitor centre they're mostly employees of suppliers of the test site some 7 test site employees 9 employees of a local elderly care centre and a couple invited as guests of an employee at 9am the train is ready for boarding the staff are in the rear of the train manning the monitoring equipment and one makes their way to the front he will be the morning's driver at roughly 9.30 the maintenance train pulls up to the column before the switch to allow it back into the depot the driver's cab is at the north end and both workers sit inside awaiting radio clearance that the route is set for the depot building but nothing can be heard the line dispatcher doesn't reply to the maintenance vehicle's requests the Maglev train is scheduled to leave the small station at 9.40am at 9.43am the train slowly rolls forward but then abruptly stops this momentary build of excitement is just for a break test the driver radio's line dispatch for permission to begin the test run 9 minutes later power is fed to the track and clearance is given the time is 9.52am in the passenger cabin there is a screen that displays the train's current speed it speeds up to 140mph 150mph then 160kmh the train in just a few seconds is close to the speed limit of the day's first run meanwhile the maintenance vehicle is still on the line just 57 seconds after departing the train's emergency brakes come on but the impact is unavoidable Trans Rapid 8 slams into the engineering vehicle due to the system's design the train hugs the track and its wedge shape front pushes the tired vehicle up essentially ripping it some 60t into the top part of the maglev's passenger compartment the front of the train is completely ripped apart leaving just the bogies and upper frame in place the maintenance vehicle is pushed back 300m or 985ft the sound of the collision can be heard from the control room and by now dispatchers knew their mistake after checking each other for any injuries the crew aboard the rear carriage of the maglev called in the collision to the control room emergency workers are sent to the crash site including the in-house fire department the wreckage was bad and as rescue workers began to attend the scene they probably didn't realise that this would be the first fatal accident involving a maglev train the two aboard the engineering train are shaken but relatively unharmed they hear banging from below them the floor is removed of their driver cab and three survivors miraculously still alive are within the wreckage their help to safety escape shoots are deployed at the rear of the maglev and some survivors managed to escape over 200 emergency workers would attend the scene cutting up parts of the maglev trying to recover survivors and bodies a crane is used to remove the engineering vehicle and large pieces of debris when a body is found it is laid out on the trackway photograph for identification and then taken away in total 23 would be dead 8 would survive the crash by the afternoon all dead and alive were recovered the wreck train would remain on the track until November aftermath so how did such an easily avoidable disaster unfold well it would soon become apparent that human error was the cause a day after the disaster the two dispatchers on duty that morning were placed under arrest and held in protective custody they are interviewed and it became clear that they had forgotten about the maintenance vehicle they would be charged and the trials postponed due to deterioration of mental health the guilt must have weighed pretty heavy on them two supervisors were also charged and fined in 2008 this was because there was a safety system in place to prevent a collision but they discouraged dispatchers from using it potentially just to save some time you see they could set up an electronic block which would stop a maglev train from entering an occupied section what's bizarre is that the authority of the dispatcher was taken as all that was needed to depart even though the engineering vehicle probably could have been seen by the maglev before the journey began investigators found that the engineering vehicle and the maglev were on two completely different radio systems meaning they couldn't communicate with one another or hear the communications of each other and the dispatcher the dispatchers were eventually tried and sentenced to 12 and 18 months suspended sentences respectively the dispatcher would become the end of the test site's license to carry the public and Transrapid 9 was showcased in 2008 but not to a paying public the project would limp along until 2011 when it was shut down with all working on site losing their jobs the only transrapid system in commercial use would be the Shang High Line but it has been slated as an overpriced vanity gadget barn and this too has had its issues the concept is cool but the future of transport sadly won't look like this so I'm going to rate this disaster as a bad day at the office and a 5 on my legacy scale this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are created with commons attribution and shareolite licensed plain difficult videos are produced by me John in the currently surprisingly sunny corner of southern London UK I'd like to thank my Patrons and YouTube members for your financial support and the rest of you who tune in every week to listen to me talk for 10 to 15 minutes or so I have Instagram and Twitter if you want to see behind the scenes stuff as well as a second channel made by John where I just do other random bits of artwork and random videos and stuff and all that's left to say is thank you very much for watching and Mr Music plays out please it is the morning of the 7th of November 2000 and a JCB digger has just smashed its way into the millennium dome Greenwich Peninsula London this is no accident the driver is wearing body armour and a gas mask and he has brought some friends with him what's unfolding is a diamond heist the millennium dome although as some consider a white elephant is the home to some pretty valuable diamonds for an exhibition the men set about attacking the thick protective glass with a nail gun and sledgehammers are being watched my name is John and today we're looking at the Brazen Millennium Dome Heist and I went on a bit of a B-roll rampage so there is a link in the description for all the extra footage I filmed London's White Elephant so it's towards the end of the 1990s and the fear and excitement of the millennium is quickly approaching planes might fall out of the sky and nuclear missiles might go off all pretty scary well here in Blighty in hometown south London the Tory and then later new labour government set about building the ninth largest building by usable space in the world the concept was scraped out of the brains of the members of the major government as a sort of world's fair the project was in gorge from 1997 when this guy got into the helm of British politics Tony Blair had got in on the 2nd of May 1997 and construction on what would become known as the Millennium Dome began in June the same year the project was intended to wow the world in celebrating the turn of the millennium the dome opened rather aptly on the 31st of December 1999 and would be open for just one year I remember as a young John and family plainly bundled into my dad's voxel cavalier chugging along the A2 to see the dome in the canvas flesh actually was the dome canvas I don't know it just kinda looks a bit like a tent any hoos in order to wow the world the dome would be crammed for the exciting exhibits one of which would be some sparkly diamonds bees were supplied by De Beers and featured a flawless 203.04 carats gem with an estimated worth of 200 million pounds in millennium money it was thought to be the most flawless in the world and was rather aptly named the Millennium Star needed to say this piece would attract some criminal attention De Beers had thought of this and had set up protection that not only stopped the robbers but allowed the public to view the precious stones closely they were placed behind bomb proof glass reportedly able to resist a 60 ton battering ram the dome itself was also fenced off as the year 2000 moved on hundreds of thousands attended the exhibition gawping at the precious stones I should say that they were part of an exhibit called the Money Zone but it was just one area out of several within the dome which each had its different theme for example religion, the body and work etc as a side note the dome experience even had its own Blackadder short film although not as good as Blackadder goes forth it's still pretty much well worth a watch but it wouldn't be all fun and learning the dome would be under the sights of a criminal element a tip off to a big heist it is the summer of the year 2000 and the police's flying squad yes that is actually part of the metropolitan police have received a tip off about a big raid on the horizon but they don't know where the tip off does involve some names and links back to an attempted robbery in February 2000 this took place in southwest London in an area called Nine Elms the robbers had targeted an armoured money van they blocked off the vans escape routes along the Nine Elms lane and a plan to bash open the vans doors by using a battering ram welded to the front of a lorry the plan however was foiled and the robbers escaped via the Thames on an inflatable boat a similar heist was attempted in Ellesford just near Chatham around here on a Kentish map in July it too was thwarted when a random police car arrived after the lorry had broken the armoured cars doors the men shot at the police and escaped once again on an inflatable boat clearly the gang were capable of at least attempting a pretty sophisticated heist and they definitely weren't afraid to use force this brings us back to the summer and the flying squad's predicament of how to find what their next hit would be well forensic analysis of the abandoned lorries allowed Kent police to trace the vehicles to two disused farms in Kent these farms were put under 24 hour surveillance another tip came in from an informer hinting that the gang were looking for a big big payday by hitting the dome the surveillance an apprehension of the gang would be called Operation Magician with this knowledge they placed surveillance at the dome on top of the already established security on the 1st of September surveillance identified three of the suspected gang members at the dome they were taking notes on the tide at the Greenwich Peninsula using video camcorders to film security entrances and to look at the CCTV cameras if it wasn't 100% certain the dome was a target before now they knew it was surveillance increased again during which more gang members were observed filming the river gang members were being spotted at the dome in an ever increasing frequency on top of this down in Kent a gang member was observed procuring a speedboat the heist seemed by at least the end of September was pretty close the valuable diamonds were replaced with fakes which means if you went there towards the end of September and saw the diamonds you weren't actually looking at the real thing a false wall was constructed inside the exhibition room which behind had a small army of police officers ready to pounce at a moment's notice as October rolled in the police had identified some potentially ideal days for the heist to go ahead and lo and behold on these days the gang attempted twice but each time abandoned their attack the first due to the speedboat having mechanical issues and the second was aborted due to low tide the next time they attempted the heist the gang were going to see it through and the police thought it would come the day after their second failed attempt the 7th of November the year 2000 the heist it is the early hours of the 7th of November and over 200 police have been deployed around the millennium dome and surrounding areas of which half were armed they were laying in wait for the criminal gang to make an attempt on the diamonds the police were placed along the Thames and at various points about the peninsula all staff in the money zone were replaced with police disguised as guards cleaners and even tour guides at roughly 9 30 in the morning the heist began a JCB digger was spotted battering its way through the perimeter fence of the dome complex and heading straight for the main building there were four men inside the JCB armed with nail guns, smoke bombs ballistic vests and gas masks the JCB smashed its way through the side of the dome and crashed into the money zone the gang set off their smoke bombs and started firing the nail gun at the thick protective glass the glass now weakened was attacked with sledge hammers the gang as far as they knew were within inches of the prize but we know the diamonds were fake and the police were there waiting to make their move in a matter of seconds after smashing through the glass the order was sent out to the police and the four gang members found themselves looking down the barrels of multiple police firearm the man in the speedboat and the other man in the van and another across the river monitoring police frequencies were also apprehended almost immediately the heist was over the men were arrested and amazingly not a single single shot was fired the arrested gang members were sent to different police stations throughout south London to be held for questioning and later on in the day Kent police collared six more suspects the trial for the gang it was found that they had invested significantly in the heist somewhere in the region of 20,000 pounds in purchasing the required equipment and hiring a lookup in Plumstead to store it the sentences varied for the seven main suspects from five years to 18 although those who got the higher end of the sentences got then reduced later on down to 15 years one of the defendants had died between a rest and trial of cancer the JCB was sold off at auction for spare parts after the manufacturer took ownership from the insurance company police lead John Shatford came under a little bit of criticism for letting the heist go into the smashing stage said in response our chief concern throughout was public safety we decided it was better to let the robbers get into the vault where they were effectively imprisoned so what of the dome well it would actually open later on in the day albeit with the money zone understandably closed the dome closed fully as planned in December 2000 but no one else knew what to do with it afterwards items from the exhibition were auctioned off in 2001 and after the site being sold off would eventually turn into the London O2 arena in 2007 so I'm going to give this event a four on the legacy scale possibly a little bit more if you live in London and possibly a little bit less if you don't this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel creative commons attribution share like licensed plain difficult videos produced by me John and currently surprisingly sunny corner of south London UK I'd like to thank my patron members and YouTube members for your financial support as well as the rest of you who tune in every week to listen to me talk and watch my dodgily drawn cartoons I have Instagram and Twitter as well as a second channel so feel free to check them out if you have some spare time and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and Mr Music play us out please plain difficult videos are financially supported by the generosity of my patron and YouTube members members get early add free access to videos usually the Monday or Tuesday before it's released on the main channel you can also get other perks depending on the pledge including your name at the end of the video right well thanks for listening to me talk back to the normal scheduled dose of well me talking so for the past few months I've been building up to this subject in my previous videos showing the long list of concrete construction failures in the state of Florida I believe for all I've covered so far failed before actually was complete but today's video is an outlier as it had been completed and occupied for quite a long time the Champlain Towers failure also marks the dramatic increase in the number of victims and financial costs it is also the most recent entry in Florida's building blunders my name is John and welcome to Plainly Difficult today we're looking at the Surfside Condominium Collapse a place to escape the cold Surfside in the early 1970s was a retreat for Canadian holiday goers it was considerably cheaper than Miami and offered a no-friels quiet place to get away one of these Canadians was Nathan Reba the lawyer come real estate developer from Ontario set about pushing a proposal to Surfside for some new luxury apartments this was in August 1979 but there was a slight snag at the city their sewage system wasn't up to snuff this had placed a moratorium on new residential developments but a mere hurdle Reba must have thought as his development offered $200,000 to the city that required water upgrade this was roughly half the total builder city needed to cough up the developers wind and dined officials in an effort to speed permits through in November 1979 the initial proposal for an overall development at Surfside was approved by the city the original buildings were to be named Champlin North and Champlin South and the southern tower was placed at 8777 Collins Avenue Surfside Florida with the north a block away there was also an Art Deco building already standing in between them this was the site originally of a hotel which had been bought up by Canadian investors for $475,000 in 1970 and was the site of an earlier failed attempt which would be taken up in the late 70s by Reba the project ran into issues in May 1980 when their lead contractor resigned a new one was brought in but there was a lot more trouble ahead building by mid 1980 was well under way but one of its site cranes collapsed and by the end of the summer it was discovered that over $10,000 worth of timber had been stolen at the end of the summer season a new contractor was hired Arnold Nickman original towers were to be 12 stories high but in August the developers applied to increase this with the addition of a penthouse level architect William Friedman didn't object nor did structural engineer Sergio Breitemann interestingly both men had slightly dodgy pasts with Friedman having his license suspended in the late 1960s for a dangerous sign structure that had collapsed Breitemann had also got into hot water in the mid 1970s for signing off a car park without steel reinforcements in November the penthouse was apparently approved but in just the same month the permit was revoked the town manager who revoked the license got into hot water himself being accused of being a peeping Tom he resigned and the penthouses were finally allowed once more the original issue was that Champlin Towers would exceed height restrictions they had been brought in to try and stop Surfside turning into a mini Miami with its towering seaside buildings the town kind of had its hand forced by allowing the extra height as the developers had already started building them meaning if they were stopped and pulled down the city would have had to deal with a hefty lawsuit the South Tower was completed in 1981 followed by the North a few months later in 1982 Reba would see several lawsuits brought against him for failing to pay for works completed and even part of the construction consortium that owned the towers also ended up in court with him Reba did get a pretty good payday however with the sale of the apartments some 22.5 million dollars making him one of the largest developers in Florida so what was the design of the Champlin Towers most notably the south one the design as we know during its turbulent construction the South Tower underwent several changes and this is reflected in the changes to the building's plans between 1979 and 1980 some were rather worrying where support beams were removed in the building's final iteration the tower was when looking down into it in the shape of an L and had 12 stories with penthouses on top it had a total of 136 apartments varying in size from 1 to 4 bedrooms the eastern side of the building had lovely views of the Atlantic Ocean the building was constructed of steel reinforced concrete it made use of a standard column and two-way slab design slabs were between 9.5 and 8 inches thick the slab were reinforced with Reba and at the point that the column connected with the horizontal floor with Reba went through the columns Reba cage the columns in the building ranged in size but for the purpose of this video I'll only talk about three types named A, C and N Type A columns were largely around the south east side of the building and were 24 inches square Type C were predominantly located at the north perimeter and central areas and were 16 inches square Type N were 8 by 16 inches and were placed on the south eastern perimeter underneath the pool deck and on the western perimeter oh yeah did I mention the complex had a pool deck this area was on the first floor and housed the heated pool planters creating a nice outside area without the need to venture onto the beach however the planters, the very heavy planters, were not actually originally specked out in the plans this caused extra stress over the smallest columns which rather worryingly was where some of the beams had been removed in the plans the waterproofing for the pool deck was placed on a flat surface instead of with a slope this would prove troublesome as the building was managed not allowing water to properly run off the buildings columns were supported by piles that had been driven into the ground this acted as an anchor holding the building in place above the pilings was the lowest accessible section of the building the carpark it had the rough footprint of the building above and was accessed via a ramp issues so not only did the project see issues with the city the problems arose with the plans right from the start the columns in some places were too narrow on the plans which meant the contractor would have to make a choice use the narrow columns and over crowd the rebar increasing the risk of corrosion or remove some rebar which weakened the structure of course there was the option of refusing to build it but we all know that wouldn't have happened clearly parts of the building were not up to code however this didn't stop construction no the building was actually completed in 1981 but that wasn't the end of the issues almost right from the start after the first residents started moving in cracks started appearing in the carpark level concrete seawater was known to seep through the foundations at high tide causing the carpark to be constantly damp and in particularly bad days could be up to two feet deep pumps were employed to combat this but it was a persistent problem on site but it wasn't just the carpark that had standing water and seepage the roof also had constant complaints of leaks over the years the building fell into disrepair and to hinder any repairs the condo association was mired in arguments stalemates and cost cutting you see the condo board was a volunteer organisation usually made up of people who were owners and residents themselves as such this often means they aren't the most professional property managers because of this professionals are brought in and are paid from a reserve fund that the board collects in the UK this is what a sinking fund is do you call that the same thing in the US as well anyway the board by the time the apartments were approaching their 40th year was very low on money this meant that when repairs were required the board had to go directly to the residents for the money rather than being spread out over months and years of ownership you might get hit with a massive bill as such residents and the board's relationship broke down board meetings would erupt into arguments and votes would be locked all while the tower deteriorated many of the exterior railings of the tower were rusting away constant lakes in the carpark and cracking columns were a concern to many eventually the board managed to get an assessment done on the building's deteriorating condition and no surprise is it wasn't good news Morabito consultants issued a report on the building in 2018 noting major construction errors on the pool deck cracking and spalling in the carpark facades cracking soffits rotting windows seals failing improper flashing on doors and windows causing leaks and serious cracks on the columns revealing rebar were all major points they even said that parts of the building pool deck were beyond their useful life so none of that was good and the bill for repairs wouldn't be any better this would result again in arguments and frustration with the condo board and in 2019 six of the seven board members resigned a new round of board members took over in 2020 and managed to secure a $15 million loan for the repairs which nearly two years after the report had grown in need and cost in a presentation from the board members to residents the point was bluntly put across but how would this multi-million dollar loan be paid off? well the residents would have to bear the cost in what's called a special assessment this put condo owners on the hook for between $80 and $200,000 depending on the apartment size paid up front or monthly for 15 years but although falling apart due to extensive repairs due the Champlain Tower's location and views still made it an attractive investment opportunity for prospective buyers several properties sold over the next year including one of the penthouses for close to $3 million in April 2021 the special assessment bills were sent out to residents but for the residents it wasn't just a financial disaster on the horizon it is the early hours of the 24th of June 2021 and passes by near the Champlain Tower's south hear noises from the building but it sounds like a car crash a tourist films through the gate to the garage where rubble and water can be seen pouring onto the ground residents aside the building are awoken by cracking as one person would describe as construction like sound this is around 1.14 in the morning and the noises were increasing a roughly 1.21 in the morning the ground floor deck gave way followed by the central portion of the northern side of the building shortly after the eastern section also plunged into the darkness the dramatic collapse happened in just 12 seconds the western section of the building surprisingly remained precariously in place within minutes the first responders arrived on the scene and in one of the gruesome modern wonders the disaster's aftermath was recorded with body cameras the air in the immediate aftermath was thick with dust obscuring street lighting in the night sky over 80 emergency response units would race to the scene immediately and begin frantically trying to recover any survivors within hours hundreds of police officers and firefighters from agencies across Miami-Dade were in attendance survivors were carried from the standing portion of the building and severely damaged sections in stretches and even on the first responders backs a cherry picker was employed in an effort to reach people trapped on the higher sections of the remaining structure evacuations took place in the hotel next door luckily due to the building being flanked by the beach on the east side no one else was at risk within the immediate vicinity as the hours dragged on more specialist rescue units began scouring the wreckage but it wasn't looking good rescue dogs sniffed over the rubble 35 people were rescued in the first few hours an onsite triage was set up and various levels of wounded were treated on site and sent off to hospitals across the Miami-Dade area a state of emergency declaration was signed by the Miami-Dade County Mayor at 4.33pm by the evening the missing list was increasing in length a fire had broken out within the depths of the rubble and was spreading horizontally by the 26th of June 127 people had been accounted for five were confirmed dead and 156 missing Champlain Towers North was voluntarily evacuated due to it being built around the same time with the same developer this also happened alongside the evacuation of Champlain East which was built in the 1990s the still standing portion of Champlain South was announced to be demolished on the 4th of July and this would be using explosives it was planned for the structure to fall into its footprint and into Collins Avenue to try to not disturb the recovery efforts on the east part of the site for the best part of a month rescue workers would continue scouring the site for survivors however it was more a case of body recovery on some days just one body and on others as many as 15 would be retrieved by the 17th of July 97 bodies had been pulled from the rubble with all but two being identified on the 23rd of July the Miami-Dade fire department stopped the rescue efforts and left the area by now all 98 were identified vital evidence in the form of important structural debris was removed and stored off site for investigation some of the damaged cars and personal property from the tower was transported to a field 10 miles away surprisingly in 2022 the site was sold off for redevelopment for $120 million to Dubai based developer Damak but what was the cause of the collapse? the investigation now this might actually be the first subject I've covered on this channel that the investigation hasn't actually been complete it has fallen on the feet of the NIST but although there isn't an official verdict yet we can go into the most likely causes as investigators and the media dug into the past of the building unsurprisingly the buildings to mulchess history came to light the 2018 report was made public information but although it highlighted many serious issues not all could have caused the initial spark that caused the collapse luckily there was some footage of the building pre-disaster the collapse beginning at the base of the building this was because as you can see the upper floors stayed intact as they fell meaning their supports had gone closer to the bottom of the building this coupled with the footage of rubble in the car park pre-collapse showed that the initiator was likely around here the second part of the collapse as seen on the video shows us that the middle section removed the support for the eastern section the western section didn't collapse this also gives us a hint but it was built slightly differently with stronger columns of their type A variety at 24 inches square the shear walls on each side of the central section were different with the western wall being thicker than its eastern counterpart post-collapse photos also hinted at a cause of the overpopulated concrete with rebar most notably in the narrower columns this meant that the concrete didn't fill the gaps in between the rebar allowing air pockets to form potentially creating areas that said rebar could corrode they also found on the concrete floor slabs that some had delaminated from their rebar that is the rebar had pulled away from within the concrete floor slabs but we already knew the building wasn't very well built but it did last 40 years well this is where poor maintenance comes into play with not addressing the gradually appearing issues over the four decades the built-in floors would only make themselves worse for example not painting the concrete at regular intervals to protect it from the corrosive seaside air anything neglected will eventually fail the building during its lifetime had rather a lot of construction projects undertaken around it the aforementioned Champlain Towers East was thrown up in the 1990s also next door there was the 2016-87 park which began construction and in 2019 a beach replenishment project was undertaken which would involve large heavy trucks of sand being brought along the 88th street which was along the building's northern perimeter exactly near where the claps had begun it was also found that during the 90s Champlain Towers South was experienced subsidence of just under 1mm per year although leading up to the disaster this had seemed to have stopped there had been reports of the pool deck having issues with in the 1990s the concrete underneath the pool needing repair from the carpark side this involved removing the damaged concrete and rust proofing the rebar been sealing it in with mortar spooling had to be repaired in 1997 again around the underside of the pool deck and waterproofing was also looked at personally I think the issue was inadequate concrete and rebar specifications which allowed to weaken beyond the point of holding itself up due to woeful maintenance in an area which loves to rust things away i.e by the sea but hey what do I know I'm just an idiot on the internet the official cause we will still have to await from the NIST so now I need to look at the aftermath a lawsuit was filed against Champlain Towers out condominium association on the 24th of June 2021 initially for 5 million dollars and this would be joined over the months by many more residents it would result on June 23rd 2022 with a 1.02 billion dollar settlement for victims of the collapse it was estimated that the collapse also caused around 1 billion dollars in property damage making it one very expensive disaster the disaster has put the focus on condo boards and how strict rules would help associations keep on top of maintenance and holding enough funds in for repairs so I'm going to call this disaster an absolute dumpster fire and unfortunately due to the event being so recent I'm not going to give it a legacy scale just yet this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are created commons that we should share like licensed plain difficult videos are produced by me John in the currently surprisingly sunny corner of southern London UK I'd like to thank my Patreon members and YouTube members for your financial support and the rest of you for tuning in every week to watch my videos I have Instagram Twitter and a second YouTube channel so check them out if you want to see behind the scenes stuff and random photographs I always have to say thank you for watching and Mr Music play us out please it is 2008 and state Chinese television is showing a new method to treat internet and computer game addiction the show is called fighting the internet demon who turned our geniuses into beasts it features a man nicknamed Tesla Trooper Yang and he's apparently found a way to treat those young internet riddled minds this form of treatment wasn't new in 2008 however and Yang's work would represent just another chapter in this medical procedures history which was well over 150 years old by the mid noughties there were many psychological medical interventions used freely in the early part of the 20th century that elicit nightmares I mean who would undergo insulin shock therapy for entertainment value but there are a few that stick in the mind excuse the pun as a cultural memory of the brutal experiences of the mentally ill at the turn of the last century one that jumps to mind is the lobotomy although largely abandoned today except for a few individual cases I've already covered this but the other treatment that was around at the same time and even used in conjunction with the ice pick was that of today's subject electroconvulsive therapy I remember from one of my visits to the museum of the mind at Bethlehem hospital the ECT machine on display it had a rather ominous worded button treat this was to administer an electric shock to the patient or victim whichever way you like to think about it I feel this word explains rather well that people who used it did generally think it would help in most cases but rather than used in specific cases ECT was given out indiscriminately even as a form of punishment today we're going to dive into the world of ECT therapy welcome to the dark side of science early beginnings our story of ECT goes back surprisingly far as far back as the first chemical batteries no less and two men in Italy Alessandro Volta Luigi Galvini Volta in the late 1790s was working on an invention called the Volta pile and this was a very early battery Galvini around the same time was working on using electricity to animate the limbs of dead frogs he found if the limbs were struck by lightning they moved he was building upon Benjamin Franklin's use of lightning Franklin had also used electricity on people for a curative treatment he also found that they would move frog's legs if he simply touched a brass hook attached to the animal to a steel plate Galvini had thought the animation was proof of animal electricity a power which made all living things move Volta upon reading a book published in 1791 by Galvini on his animal electricity thought instead of the power being within the animal it was actually from the two metal objects touching this led him to create the Volta pile a year after Galvini's death he named the chemical action that creates electricity Galvanism but what does this all have to do with ECT well after Galvini's death in 1798 his work will be taken up by his nephew Giovanni Aldini Aldini would take his uncle's work animating dead frogs and up his game to animating dead people freshly dead bodies for scientific experiments were not the easiest thing to come by but for one way at the end of a hangman's noose Aldini was able to procure the freshly dead body of convicted murderer George Forster in London his execution took place on the 18th of January 1803 at Newgate as soon as the man was hanged the body was cut down and taken to Aldini in a nearby house Aldini applied an electrical current to the deceased his face and his jaw began to move and an eye opened next he put current through the dead body and its arm raised with a clenched fist Onlookers thought Forster was coming back to life but he was not and someone had noted that if he had his sentence of hanged by the neck till death would still stand a contemporary report of the event from the Newgate calendar stated the professor, we understand had made the use of galvanism also in several cases of insanity and with complete success it was the opinion of the first medical men that this discovery, if rightly managed and duly processed would not fail to be of great and perhaps as yet unforeseen utility the first line of that statement is what's valuable here for us, you see Aldini wasn't just electrifying the dead but also the living, over a lot of the 18th and 19th centuries doctors and scientists experimented with inducing seizures for the treatment of the insane and galvanism was just another method Aldini wasn't also the only one to try this out British physician James Linde also experimented with electricity again reporting positive results throughout the 19th century galvanism was used in asylums and developed into electroph therapy but it was at the time mainly a case of shock and see what happens as a means of subduing patients electroconvulsive therapy so I'm going to skip some years forward for us to meet Hungarian Neuropsychiatrists Ladislas J. Maduna he in 1934 had introduced a thing called convulsive therapy he believed that schizophrenia could be alleviated by epileptic seizures but how to cause such seizures well, Maduna started using chemical compounds for this effect mainly camphor and metrozol by the end of the decade metrozol induced convulsive therapy was widespread throughout the mental health industry spread upon schizophrenia metrozol, although caused seizures was difficult to administer in some cases requiring doctors to chase patients around wards in order to force administer the drugs as such someone thought to combine convulsive therapy with the widely employed shocking of asylum patients with electricity and this is where Hugo Solletti joins our story. In April 1938 he undertook his first electro shock experiment on a human Solletti's inspiration had come from seeing an abattoir using a 125 volt electric shock to knock out a pick before slaughter Solletti and his assistant Lucio Bini, devised that if the electric shock was applied straight to the head, reliable convulsions could be induced. The first victim was in April 1938 this was a man affected by delusions detained by the police he was taken to the clinic for mental and nervous diseases in Rome the police probably thought that this was the best place for the mentally ill patient but Solletti and Bini saw this as a perfect opportunity his head was shaved and he was taken to a lab in which a bed was placed next to an ECT machine in their previous experiments with dogs around half had died from cardiac arrest. Both men knew this time round could be the same and their treatment would quickly become an execution 80 volts was passed across the patient's temple then shortly after 90 volts after a few minutes of rest they sent a shock of 110 volts the patient convulsed and turned blue he was becoming oxygen starved but at 48 seconds the seizure stopped and he returned to normal breathing after several treatments over the coming months the patient appeared to recover and returned to a normal state of mind and was even later reunited with his family Solletti and Bini developed their treatment and undertook a clinical trial they found in a variety of cases that between 10 and 20 treatments were enough to see an improvement they also found that patients post treatment had amnesia of the therapy meaning that unlike metrozol the patient wasn't scared of the induced seizures the treatment proved to be more controllable, cheaper and easier to administer than the chemical equivalent the Italians treatment spread across the UK and US Australia and even Germany by 1940 and post World War II the treatment spread even further quickly it was found that ECT was beneficial for other mental health conditions most notable in depression So how does it work? the original machine built by Bini and Solletti had electrodes that were placed on each side of the patient's head around 120 volts of direct current was applied with the help of a sine wave although the waveform would later be modified and the shock would last between 1 and 6 seconds now the dose level has to exceed the seizure threshold of the patient but this is only known through trial and error some physicians started off with a standard dose and adjust where others made an educated guess about the patient's age, gender and weight it is thought, although not actually clinically confirmed that the electrical current creates neural elasticity allowing the brain to rewire itself hopefully improving the patient's symptoms in its original form ECT had issues with the side effects of memory disturbance beyond the beneficial short-term anesia and confusion as such Bini and Solletti experimented with their method and changed it up to use a unilateral electro placement in that only one side of the head would be wired up meaning the current would only pass through a portion of the brain and not the whole thing another change was a step away from using sine waves to a short pulse wave the original form was known as unmodified ECT and would be more prevalent throughout the 1940s and 1950s but memory loss and confusion weren't the only side effects practitioners also noted a rare issue fractures and dislocations of the patient's longer bones this was due to the seizures being pretty full on as such a modified treatment was devised with the use of muscle relaxants and short-term anesthesia this came into use in the early 1950s but the treatment was already becoming known as a controversial procedure in mental asylums it was often administered without informed consent and used as punishment for unruly behaviour often the threat alone was all that was required to keep order on the wards and like lobotomies it was administered to patients who would be more hurt rather than helped ECT was also used on homosexual people in an effort to shock the gay out of them footage of ECT permeated to the wider public affecting the way it was seen as more of a cruel act than a curing treatment this in conjunction with its use on children and the lack of informed consent tainted the treatment in the realm of public opinion falling out of favour by the time in the 1960s had rolled in a lot of the hero treatments of the 1930s began to drop out of use this was part due to improvements in psychology and in medications that bypassed the need for physical intervention although when used on the correct patient and in modified form ECT had a greater efficacy than the old brain poking but it still fell out of use it didn't go away you see it did work and into the 1980s a more controlled form was used on particular individuals who needed the treatment under strict medical supervision but that wasn't the case everywhere and here is the man you've probably been waiting the whole video for me to talk about Tesla Trooper Yang this is Yang and he is a psychologist based in the 4th hospital of Linyi Linyi mental hospital which hilariously has 34 one star reviews on google no surprise when you hear what Yang has been getting up to you don't get the name like electric shock madman Yang for nothing and spoiler the shock was ECT Yang thought the unmodified ECT would be perfect for treating internet addicted teenagers electric shocks and no anesthesia Yang had gone old school he began his studies into internet addiction in 1999 and by 2006 he was using ECT regularly to treat his addicted victims this will culminate in the 2008 TV show that I mentioned at the beginning of this video Yang had created a rather lucrative business charging roughly $800 a month to the parents of the internet addicted individuals this epitomized the negative public image towards ECT but it was just medicalised torture in Yang's case it probably was torture one of his more concerning quotes when talking about his therapy was that ECT is only painful for those with internet addiction jeez of course he didn't get informed consent from his underage patients China would actually ban the use of ECT for internet addiction in 2009 after which Yang started using lower voltage pulse electronic acupuncture because that's a thing now there's a lot more to Yang's story so let me know in the comments if you'd like a full video on this guy so in conclusion ECT is a bit of a mixed bag it does work for some it's been abused a lot during its 90 or so years of use in its current form the introduction of more controllable waveforms and pulse types has made the treatment ever more effective it's nowhere near as horrific as the lobotomy which even that still has its uses in modern day medicine so it's rating time I'm going to give this one 6 thunderbolts out of 10 this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are creative commons attribution play difficult videos are produced by me John in the currently sunny corner of southern London UK I'd like to thank my Patreons and YouTube members for your financial support as well as the rest of you for tuning in every week I have Instagram and Twitter so check them out if you want to see behind the scenes images and all sorts of random stuff all that's left to say is thank you for watching and Mr Music plays out please it is the evening of the 4th of December 1957 and a thick fog has descended upon southeast London UK commuter trains out of some of London's busiest terminals are severely delayed the trains are busy tonight with many hopping on the first they can get on one of these trains is an electric multiple unit bound for Hayes Bromley Kent the train departs Charing Cross 30 minutes late and heads down the line to Waterloo East Ben London Bridge, New Cross St John's owing to the late departure and fog the Hayes train much like others have missed their slot in a carefully arranged timetable after slowing passing the St John's signal box the train is brought to a stand at a signal just before the next signal box the signaler needs to know where the train is going as it's running out of sync this is not unusual however this rather run of the mill filled up will be the scene for the third worst rail disaster in British history in which two trains would collide and 90 would die welcome to Plainly Difficult my name is John and today we will dive into the Lewisham St John's rail crash I'm back at the scene of a disaster in the flesh I've travelled through here hundreds of times over the years but it's only been recently that I've discovered it was the location of the crash I posted some photos and footage up on my Instagram last month when I was down here getting some film and a good few of you guessed correctly where I was oh and whilst I'm here as always the b-roll footage is up on my second channel the link is in the description as well as the pinned comment our disaster today is a big one involving two trains and a bridge collapse I'll keep the background light on this one and I won't dive too deep into British railway I've covered this before in the Harrow and Wilston and Clapham crashes background St John's has always been a bit of a nowhere stop there's not much to do around here and as such it's not really a destination station more just a suburban stop that commuter trains call at it marks roughly half way between New Cross and its interchange in the 1950s at least with the London Underground East London Line and its south-eastern railways and its interchange at Lewisham trains bypass St John's on the through lines on their way to either London Bridge or down on the south-eastern mainline but although not a massively busy station the area is busy with junctions and can become a bit of a pinch point for trains heading south-east out towards Kent the St John's signal box is responsible for signaling trains towards Lewisham and the North Kent Line each major junction in this period of British railways signaling is controlled by its own signal box as such when a train is bound for Hayes from London avoiding Lewisham it negotiates the down-through across St John's junction and onto the down-through south-eastern mainline from here the train has to negotiate the park's bridge junction taking the diverging routes down onto the Mid Kent Line St John's is also interesting in that running over the junction is a bridge which takes trains towards Peckham from Lewisham but for this video at least it's irrelevant the south-eastern mainline through lines also accommodate fast services towards the Kent Coast the 1950s were a rather interesting time nowadays if you sit at St John's you'll only see electric multiple units but in 1957 the electric, diesel and steam powered formations the same could be said for the signaling at the time both automatic colour lights as well as absolute block signaling practices were in operation but around St John's it was colour light signaling and I'll briefly explain what each signal means as it's pretty vital in our story right day one basic signaling for you there's four types of signal danger which is red caution which is one yellow caution which is double yellow and green which is clear yellow, double yellow and green are all proceed aspects but they tell the driver the condition of the signals ahead green means that the next two signals are showing proceed double yellow means that the next signal is proceed and yellow means that the next signal is showing red stop or danger remember this for later the disaster right back to that foggy evening in December 1957 at roughly 8 minutes past 6pm an express train consisting of a battle of Britain class number 34066 named Spitfire was hauling 11 coaches carrying around 700 passengers at around this time it departed Cannon Street heading for Ramsgate the train between London Bridge and New Cross was receiving all clear signals it was travelling slower than usual mainly due to the fog taking 10 minutes to reach there from Cannon Street by this time the Hayes train was only brought to a stand at the signal just before Parkesbridge Junction this was because the signal protecting the junction ahead was holding a Hastings bound diesel electric train the signal at Parkesbridge junction had got confused over which train was due to go to Hayes this was because of issues with the describer system and the thick fog not allowing the signaler to see the actual train in the flesh with two trains now backed up at Parkesbridge Junction signals the Hayes train was protected in the rear by signal Lima 18 this was around 18 minutes past 6 in the evening and the Ramsgate train was approaching St John's the train was travelling around 35 miles an hour it went past the double yellow and single yellow with driver true making no reduction in speed it was quickly approaching Lima 18 at danger the fireman aboard the steam locomotive was the first to see the signal making it danger there was roughly 138 yards between the signal and the rear of the Hayes train nowhere near enough to stop the train in time at 1820 the Ramsgate train hit the rear of the Hayes train the Hayes train was formed to two four car units and a two car unit at the rear the impact pushed the rear two cars forward into the 8th carriage completely destroying it the tender and leading coach at Ramsgate train were thrown off the track this dislodged a pier of the bridge just beyond St John's signal box causing it to fall and crush two coaches a third train approaching the bridge heading towards Lewisham luckily stopped just short of the now disappeared main span 89 were killed instantly with another dying in hospital of their injuries around 60% of the fatalities were aboard the Ramsgate train's two front carriages which were now crushed under the bridge two households adjacent to the line called the London Ambulance and Met Police Services emergency lines roughly at around 22 minutes past 6pm the fog hindered emergency services hiding the true scale of the disaster all services that required movement towards Lewisham were cancelled causing havoc for pretty much anyone needing to get home in southeast London traction current was isolated all evening and into the early morning to help rescue efforts the last injured survivor was removed four hours after the collision it would take just over a week for the line to be cleared the bridge removed and replaced with a temporary structure the aftermath now why did the accident happen the Ramsgate train was found to have working breaks, it had been tested before the journey however the guard when interviewed after the accident stated that he didn't feel any break application prior to the impact the fireman and driver although shaken up were actually alive and were interviewed in firemen, hairs interview he stated that my driver didn't ask me to see the signals between New Cross and St John's starter nor did he cross the foot plate to view the signals we were running normally I estimate speed at St John's at about 40mph this is telling because you see on UK trains drivers are placed on the left side of the cab but the signals around the accident area were actually on the right hand side of the running line meaning you would have to look across the front of the engine severely reducing the distance that you can see which when coupled to the reduced visibility of the fog meant seeing and reacting to the signals was severely hindered sadly the answer to the disaster was plain and simple driver through the Ramsgate train just didn't react to the signals which could have been helped by asking the fireman who usually occupied the right hand side of the cab to observe the right hand sighted signals in the 1958 report into the crash it was state in its conclusion I am therefore convinced that driver true did not see signals Lima 16 Lima 17 or Lima 18 and accordingly he did not make a break application until after his fireman had called out that Lima 18 was at red criminal proceedings would be launched upon driver truth for manslaughter but the jury could not reach a verdict and he was acquitted at a second trial but the real issue although caused by the driver was the lack of train protection systems I mean a very similar disaster unfolded at the start of the decade at Harron Willsden in 1952 AWS or automatic warning system was gradually being rolled out at the time mainly for semaphore controlled areas but Lewisham showed it was really required everywhere the system would be rolled out across the british rail network and even still forms the backbone of british train protection systems and warning systems today albeit augmented with train protection and warning system so this disaster I am going to rate it as a bad day at the office and a number 6 on the legacy scale this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are creative commons attribution share a light license plain difficult videos are produced by me john in the currently very windy corner of southern london uk I'd like to thank my patrons and youtube members for your financial support and also the rest of you who tune in every week to see your dose of me talking I have an instagram so go and check that out for random pictures and odds and sods of things I get up to when not working on videos and I've also got twitter if you're enjoying this outro song then please check it out on my second channel made by john and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and mr music play us out please it is the 18th of february 2003 and the city of daegu south korea is in mourning the late morning rush hour has become the scene of a terrible disaster the usually bustling daegu metro is quiet trains have stopped and the normally busy jongangno station is closed to the public and has enveloped another that pulled up alongside it emergency services scramble to try and enter the station but the smoke and toxic fumes are too much most onlookers know something terrible has unfolded but to what extent at this point no one knows as the coming days unfold and a wider picture of the disaster is uncovered it becomes apparent that it is one of the country's worst peacetime tragedies but it was no accident unlike other well known subway fires it was a deliberate act compounded by inadequate fire suppression systems and incompetence that brought sorrow to daegu today I'm looking at the tragic daegu subway fire welcome to plainly difficult the daegu subway today's video will start with a brief history of the city's metro system it's important as it was a contributing factor for the disaster but also because I do like to nerd out on these things so the city of daegu is the third largest in South Korea in terms of population with roughly 2.5 million residents because of this it's probably unsurprising that it was considered for a metro system daegu by the 1980s had a heavily overcrowded downtown area the city had seen a lot of investment under the park cheongki regime and as such it was swelling and clogged up with traffic because of this in 1985 a consultation was set out to figure how to improve the city's transportation infrastructure and make the area more efficient to move around in in 1989 a feasibility study was launched to see if building a metro was even possible all the consultations were completed by 1991 and the first digging began for line 1 in December the same year six years later the first section opened to the public the final part of the line from jinxiong to daeguk opened on the 10th of May 2002 one of the line's major stations is jonggangno station but we will stick a pin in this station for a little bit later in the video the network would continue to grow with line 2 opening in 2005 and even a monorail being added to the city in 2015 but those to final 2 we will probably won't need to worry about for this video back to jonggangno station so it was built as part of the original stretch of line 1 it was a two-platform two-track affair with the two tracks running next to each other the station is in the heart of the city which boasted plenty of places to work and to scratch that retail itch it even had a shopping centre built into the station with direct entrances to the transport hub this made the station the second busiest on the network behind van woldang station noticeable for being the only interchange between lines 1 and 2 but as a side note again for this purpose of the video it's irrelevant as line 2 wasn't opened by the time of today's disaster but although very busy the station had some of the network's narrowest platforms the trains that worked the line were the machine 1000 series tegu metro trains they run off 1500 volts DC over headlines and were formed of six carriages each carriage has four passenger doors per side and they were made of aluminium body shells with plastic interiors and vinyl covered seats and plastic handles in the early 2000s the metro ran serving the city people pile on and pile off as well until a day in February 2003 the fire it was the morning rush of the 18th of February 2003 and the metro trains in tegu are crowded with passengers the early morning rush subsided and picked up again with workers for the city's retail areas many shops in the city open around 10 30 am as such the morning trains get passengers between 9 and 10 am train number 1079 was no different it was travelling along the line between jin sheng and to an shim station the journey takes its way through the heart of the city one of the passengers aboard is kim de han a semi-paralyzed ex-taxi driver in 2001 he suffered a stroke and in its wake his mental health had significantly deteriorated this would explain why he is travelling on board train 1079 with two cartons of flammable liquid and a lighter after the train departed station kim began to frantically try to spark his lighter this was around 9.53 in the morning some passengers saw this and tried to stop him in the struggle one of the cartons fell onto the floor spinning its contents as the train pulled into jong angono station a spark hit the fluid and caught a light kim's legs and back caught on fire train 1079 fully birthed into the platform and the train doors opened many fled including the perpetrated kim by now the fire was close to enveloping all six carriages as the train's plastic heavy interior burned with thick black smoke it choked the passengers saloons the fire now visible to the train operator choy yong hwan wasn't immediately reported some passengers who had managed to escape pulled fire alarms but this was ignored by the machine and equipment centre at 9.55 am train 1080 was headed in the opposite direction it left tegu station towards jong angono station the metro's controller contacted train operator of 1080 choy sang yaw requesting he approached jong angono station at caution due to a fire that they could see on their cctv monitors choy birthed his train alongside the full inferno that was train 1079 quickly the flame spread across to the other train he opened the doors and then quickly closed them to try and stop the smoke from entering what he had actually done was trap his passengers inside with the fire soon enough train 1080 was also now a blazing inferno for now two uncontrollably on fire trains tripped the fire detection system in the station which closed some of the fire doors hindering escape from the station for many another side effect was that the overhead power lines were also switched off train 1080 would only have its batteries to power the doors choy made free announcements advising passengers to remain seated whilst he contacted railway officials when he finally got through he was advised to flee the train he tried to open the doors but also took his train key and escaped however the train now low on power hadn't actually opened up all of the carriages roughly 79 people were trapped inside and would sadly die the fire spread around the station filling it with black smoke the station wasn't equipped with emergency lighting or sprinklers because of this many became lost in the vast underground area and subsequently died of asphyxiation the built-in ventilation system couldn't extract the smoke quick enough further hindering any escape emergency workers couldn't enter the station due to the toxic fumes and it would take until half one in the afternoon to fully extinguish the fire body recovery began at 3.30pm and around 1300 rescue workers had attended the scene in total officially 192 had died in the fire however this number is not precise rather grimly this was due to the intensity of the fire meaning that some remains were not at all remaining DNA played a vital role in victim identification along with mobile phone records and in one case possessions were found but no body 151 were also injured making the disaster one of the worst for peacetime South Korea the aftermath Needless to say the disaster shocked the nation in the subsequent investigations the materials used in the railroad carriages came under scrutiny it would seem the lessons from the Baku Metro fire and the King's Cross station disaster were unfortunately not learnt Metro trains were not equipped with fire extinguishers and a lack of proper ventilation and emergency lighting in the station proved to be a big killer with many suffocating outside of the trains but even with all of this the disaster could have been lessened if the train operators of both trains had acted more decisively the driver of 1079 didn't report the fire straight away and the driver of 1080 left the doors closed for way too long didn't make sure that everything was open and abandoned his train without helping his passengers as such both men were found guilty of criminal negligence and sentenced to 4 and 5 years in prison respectively but what of the person who caused the disaster Kim Dae Hun well he was found guilty of arson and homicide the death penalty was sought from the victims families and the prosecution but he was instead handed life imprisonment this wouldn't last as Kim would die in August 2004 from long term illness large parts of line 1 were closed down for extensive refurbishment works improving fire resistance and suppression systems the fleet was revamped and renovated with less flammable materials but this would not just impact Taegu but other metros across South Korea where fireproofing work would be conducted hinting at a pretty big oversight in the rush to modernize the country the disaster is a lesson for all metros across the world where fire can really be devastating it's sad though that so many had to lose their lives to relearn the age-old lessons of fires and tunnels are horrific this is a plain difficult production all videos on the channel are creative commas attribution share like license plain difficult videos are produced by me John nice and sunny corner of southern London UK I'd like to thank my Patreon and YouTube members for your financial support as well as the west of you for coming in and viewing every week I have Instagram and Twitter and a second YouTube channel so check them out for stuff behind the scenes and all that's left to say is Mr Music play us out please and thank you for watching it is around 12pm on the 19th of July 1985 and it is like any other day the village of Starver, Prento, Italy but the average midday is interrupted with rumbling no one knows this but the noise has come from further up the Rio de Starver valley and it's roughly 180,000 cubic meters of mud, sand and water released from two failed dams Starver would be hit with water and mud and debris at speeds of up to 56mph the resulting loss of life would rank this day as one of the country's deadliest in peacetime today I'm looking at the Valdes starver dam collapse my name is John and welcome to Plainly Difficult there's money in the hills the area around the starver valley has been a home to mining ever since the 16th century the region was home to various mineral deposits fluorite began being exploited from 1934 in small industrial operations but if we will fast forward to the 1960s and 1961 in particular a new plant is being opened to better achieve higher grade fluorite at the same time a basin was produced and a small starter dam was constructed to hold back the byproduct of the operation tailings you see the method the plant was using was known as froth flotation this method creates a greater concentration of fluorite but also tailings, tailings are basically all of the leftover rock, sand and not required materials they are stored in a basin where the water is decanted off and recycled and then the dry tailings then becomes the base for another layer of tailings on top the original dam at starver was constructed of locally sourced materials creating a gravel core a sand shell was placed over the core the downstream slope was raised at an angle of about 32 degrees to a final height of 25 meters to save money the hillside was made part of the basin by 1967 the mont Edison Company was granted the concession to operate the mine and by extension the dam as the industrialized mining ramped up the site would need more tailings storage as such the mine decided to build another dam and base in just a few feet upstream from the original the second dam was built without any real anchoring to the ground at around 1969 it was allowed to grow in size at less than an ideally controlled rate with even less than ideal drainage eventually the foot of the second dam would extend out to the pond section of the lower tailings dam just as a side note here the water pond on top of these types of impalments are usually not allowed to get close to the dam part as it can erode the loot laid material water was drained via pipe work that ultimately led into the star of the river the pipe work ran through the basins and the dams and had drain holes within it it would later be found that they did not do a pretty good job at draining even weakening the dams leaving heavy rainfall while allowing water to seep out the lower dam by 1971 ceased to be raised leaving just the upper dam as the sole depository for tailings in the mid 1970s the operation was transferred to a company called Flora Mine by 1978 the second dam was towering over the lower and its use was also discontinued only for a few years however when in 1982 it was put back into service during the mines booming use a number of residential apartments were built to house the workers coming from different parts of Italy the site that employed improper planned dams with inadequate draining would not be a surprise to anyone in experiencing some issues with its basins and dams in 1985 two partial failures of the site's water drainage system resulted in a partial landslip and sinkhole in the upper basin and a sinkhole in the lower basin it was found that the pipes were poorly placed within the dams and basin causing them to sag under the weight of the silt deposits the two failures were repaired and the lower basin pipes were diverted by 1985 the total height of the structure was some 60 meters and water was being pumped into the upper basin even with the failing drainage but what could go wrong the collapse it is around 20 minutes past noon on the 15th of July 1985 at a large boom erupts in the starva valley within milliseconds the upper dam and basin had failed the weight of the tailings silt and water smashed into the lower basin bearing in mind that the upper dam was taller than the lower there was no chance of the older structure being able to hold back the massive material certainly the lower dam also failed as the water seeped into the overstressed structure the combined destructive force of both impoundments started to slide down the valley white dust was kicked up in the air and the dam's 180,000 cubic meters flow of semi fluid slime picked up speed descending the valley slopes it reached speeds of up to 90 kilometers an hour and was herding towards the village of starva in its wake some 50 houses would be destroyed hundreds of trees would be uprooted and 8 bridges demolished the apartments built for the mine workers were also completely wiped off the map the flow wasn't slowed down by the village and the torrent continued until it reached the avizio river some 4.2 kilometers or 2.6 miles away the insuring chaos caused 268 lives to be lost 100 people were also injured and only 8 victims would be rescued alive after an extensive search and rescue effort clean up and rebuilding would take many years and the true scale of the loss would take a while to sink in but although tragic the cause had to be established the investigation the remains of the dam and flow of debris offered some evidence on where the disaster began it showed clearly the issue was within the dam structure but some of the most important places to investigate were in eyewitness accounts of before, during and after the collapse the sinkholes that appeared earlier in the year came to light and the improper rising of the second dam pointed at a maintenance and management issue it was found that even though the drainage pipes had began to sag water was still pumped behind the impoundment which resulted in a weaker structure weight behind the dam was too much for the course and loose sand beach of the structure it was found during the investigation that the dam's location was also unsuitable right from the start with the original lower basing being constructed on steep marshy land as we know from earlier on in the video using a hillside saves cost on a larger impoundment in the mid 1970s technicians even raised issues with the second dam that it was on dangerous ground however the company continued to increase the height irrespective of the warnings the ministerial inquiry into the disaster would conclude the plant collapsed essentially because it was designed built and managed in such a way as to not offer those safety margins that civil society expects from works that can jeopardize the existence of entire human communities the upper embankment in particular was poorly founded poorly drained statically at limit it could only collapse at the slightest modification to its precarious conditions of equilibrium as such 10 mine officials were charged with criminal negligence culpable disaster and multiple manslaughter and prison sentences were handed out in 1992 starve a village was reconstructed and eventually repopulated the land recovered but the wounds in the local psyche would take much longer although some saw prison time for their negligence history sadly continues to repeat itself at various tailings dams across the world this is a playdifficult production all videos on the channel are creative commons attribution share like licensed playdifficult videos are produced by me john in a currently very sunny and warm corner of south london uk i have patreon and youtube members so i'd like to thank you for your financial support as well as the rest of you for tuning in every week just to watch my videos and hear me talk i have instagram twitter and a second channel made by john and all that's left to say is thank you for watching and mr music play us out please thank you for listening it is 2007 and an old film is being restored it has long been thought to have been lost the movie from french pioneer george millies has eluded movie historians it has long been mislabeled as another film by another early director but the lost media has seen the projector once again the movie depicts in its own unique style the 20th century's worst volcanic eruption in which 30 000 people would be consumed by the disaster in just a matter of minutes the film's name is exact and to the point the eruption of mount pelay a beautiful island with a deadly inhabitant martinique is part of the archipelago of the antilles located in the caribbean sea the island is beautiful with its most prominent feature mount pelay overlooking all who call the landmass home the highest point at 1397 meters or 4583 feet above sea level and is thought to be roughly 400 000 years old although a source of beauty mount pelay has also been the source of death on the island erupting several times in its recorded history people have been known to occupy the island since the first century initially by the arowax then by the caribs the island was chartered in 1493 by christopher columbus from his vessel on another columbus voyage wouldn't set foot on the island until 1502 columbus encountered indigenous peoples who called the island martinio the name was bastardized into martinique over generations of european encounters and settlements now like many other caribbean islands its history was post european encounter marked by several cases of different settlers spanish, french, british and the accompanying battles and naval skirmishes that go along with colonization and when europeans weren't fighting with one another they fought with the indigenous people but i don't think i can do this part of the island's history justice instead i'll focus on our main point for our story the city of sun pierre it was founded in 1635 by pierre belain a french trader and adventurer it served as the first permanent french colony on the island it would become one of the cultural and financial centres of the island but also the source of a loss of poor luck in 1780 all of the houses in the city were destroyed by a storm surge which killed roughly 9000 inhabitants the city was rebuilt and gradually repopulated garnering the name paris of the caribbean by the end of the 19th century the city's population was between 25 and 28000 but the new century would start off with a disaster mount pelé erupts mount pelé had been indicating it was due for full blown eruption since 1792 with the first of two minor eruptions the second of which took place in 1851 it would take roughly 52 years for mount pelé to truly unleash her power in april 1902 people who had gone close to the top of the mountain noticed sulfurous vapours emitting from newly formed holes known as fumaroles not much was thought of this as others had appeared and disappeared previously however this time it was bad by the 25th of april 1902 a large cloud emerged from the top of the mountain throwing rocks out no one and nothing was damaged and as such nothing more was thought of it the next day an explosion near the mountain top occurred coating the surrounding area with ash and again authorities saw little to be concerned about on the 27th a group of hikers climbed to discover a new lake 150 metres wide or 590 foot wide had been formed the smell of sulfur was unbearable and over the coming days it descended down the mountain to san pierre some 6.4 miles away the stench made animals and humans feel sick alike a couple of villages closer to the volcano were increasingly becoming covered in ash the riviere, their pares and the river rock salane began to bulge at their banks pushing rubble and debris along their journeys down the mountain pele was warning it was about to blow a couple of days later on the 2nd of May at 11.30 in the evening pele emitted sounds of explosions the ground rumbled and the mountain blew out black smoke half of the island was scattered with pumice, dust and ash as the 2nd turned into the 3rd a change in wind direction pushed the ash northwards away from the island but on Saturday the 4th ash would once again fall on san pierre some decided to flee the city but others from the villages around the area sought out san pierre for refuge brief lull came in the morning of Monday the 5th but by around lunchtime smoke and dust reappeared one of the craters walls up mount pele collapsed causing a lahar of mud and boiling water to thunder down the blanche river flooding a local sugar works san pierre received more refugees throughout the day as well as some residents deciding to flee you see it was thought that the city would be safe as such officials encouraged the population to stay put even refusing ships permission to depart but it would turn out to be anything but safe the city was plunged into darkness as the electrical grids succumbed to the atmospheric changes in the early hours of the 7th of May explosions rang out from pele a mountain top glowed orange another lull came in the form of the eruption of solfier san vincent on the island of saint vincent this smaller disaster was hoped would reduce the pressure on pele at 7.52 on the 8th of May thought difference was receiving a radio transmission from san pierre apparently always looking good finally the transmission went dead a mushroom cloud over pele has shot up into the sky a pyroclastic surge shot down the mountainside sticking to the ground directly at san pierre the cloud was travelling at roughly 100 miles an hour or 160 kilometers an hour hitting temperatures of over 1000 degrees centigrade nearly 2000 degrees fahrenheit upon reaching the city it smashed through buildings animals and humans alike anything that could burn did a ship the cs grappler sunk taking all aboard with her a handful of survivors who on the fringes of the city managed to make their way out but most would die of severe burns the pyroclastic cloud had covered an area of roughly 21 kilometers squared san pierre was now silent and cut off to the outside world the governor of the island Louis Moutette was in the city at the time of the disaster now leaderless a standing governor ordered a french cruiser to sail to the city to find out the cause of the silence she was the french cruiser sushi and managed to rescue 30 people from damaged vessels which had tried to escape san pierre the city was ruined and burning and an estimated nearly 30,000 people had perished the cleanup began within a few days systematically rescuers made their way through the ruins many of the dead looked calm almost frozen in ti