Texas City Disaster Essay

1000 Words2 Pages

The Texas City Disaster of 1947 was a disaster that really left a impact to the world. The Texas City Disaster of 1947 was one of the world's worst industrial disasters.
Two days before the disaster a fire had occurred at the dock where the boat was stationed. The fire that happened two days before the disaster was started by a cigarette. And their is a law stating that their is no smoking on or around the dock. The grandcamp boat was a recently re-activated boat that measured 437 feet in length. The Grandcamp served in World War II and the Pacific Theater. The Grandcamp was loaded down with two thousand two hundred tons of cargo. Their was another ship docked in the harbor called the High Flyer and it contained nine sixty one tons of ammonium …show more content…

At eight o’clock the crew could see smoke coming from the boat. And at nine o’clock the captain ordered his crew to steam the fire. It is a method where steam is piped into extinguishers to preserve the cargo. Their was so much steam that it blew the hatches open and it started blowing out of the ship in a yellow and orange color. The unusual color and smell of the smoke attracted many people and many of the people noticed that the water around the boat started boiling. The fire grew so big that it started to attack the people around the dock and started to burn them. Then it happened the ammonium nitrate exploded and destroyed the boat. Where the ammonium nitrate was stored it blew a huge hole in the side of the boat and and almost completely blew the boat in half. The destruction of the explosion was so bad that it destroyed the whole town of Texas City. The shock of the explosion was so bad that people felt it in louisiana two hundred and fifty miles away. The explosion caused a fifteen foot wave that was detectable one hundred miles away. Any buildings near by were completely flattened to the ground. Anybody within forty miles away their windows were shattered. The explosion was so great that it sent all of the cargo on board such as peanuts, tobacco, twine, and bunker oil two thousand to three thousand feet in the air. It was so loud that the blast was heard one hundred …show more content…

It killed the majority of the people on board the Grandcamp that day and killed many of people living in Texas City. When the explosion occurred it killed many people living in Texas City and most of the people living their were owners of dogs, cats, and many other pets. Well when the explosion killed the owners, many of the pets would be waiting outside on the front porch of the owners house for their owner to come (if the house still had a porch) and their owner never came and many of the pets died of starvation. When the anchor of the Grandcamp was found the town of Texas City put it up in their park to remember this tragic day and the propellor of the High Flyer stands right next to it in the park. Their was one big funeral for many of the people that died that day. More than five thousand people attended the funeral. Hundreds of lawsuits were filed and many of them were won. The explosion damaged one hundred million dollars worth of buildings, parks, hospitals, and many other things. Congress granted Texas City seventeen million dollars to repair the town and start to rebuild. And another way that people helped out was by doing fundraisers for the city. One fundraiser made one million dollars. The song “The Day Texas City Turned Into a Fiery Hell” was made fifty years later and was based off of the explosion at Grandcamp. It was recorded by Sam

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