Halifax Explosion
| Halifax Explosion | |
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A view of the pyrocumulus cloud
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| Location | Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada |
| Date | 6 December 1917 9:04:35 (AST) |
| Deaths | 2,000 (estimate) (1,950 confirmed) |
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Non-fatal injuries
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9,000 (approximate) |
 Mont-Blanc pilot Francis Mackey recalls Halifax 1917 explosion, 6:38, CBC Archives
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Determining 9:04:35 a.m. as the precise time of the Halifax Explosion, 6:54, December 4, 1992, CBC Archive
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 Surviving the disaster of the Halifax Explosion, 6:54, December 1, 1957, CBC Archive
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The Halifax Explosion was a maritime disaster in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, on the morning of 6 December 1917. SS Mont-Blanc, a French cargo ship laden with high explosives, collided with the Norwegian vessel SS Imo in the Narrows, a strait connecting the upper Halifax Harbour to Bedford Basin. A fire on board the French ship ignited her cargo, causing a large explosion that devastated the Richmond district of Halifax. Approximately 2,000 people were killed by blast, debris, fires and collapsed buildings, and an estimated 9,000 others were injured.
Mont-Blanc was under orders from the French government to carry her cargo of high explosives from New York via Halifax to Bordeaux, France. At roughly 8:45 am, she collided at low speed – approximately one knot (1 to 1.5 miles per hour or 1.6 to 2.4 kilometres per hour) – with the unladen Imo, chartered by the Commission for Relief in Belgium to pick up a cargo of relief supplies in New York. The resulting fire aboard the French ship quickly grew out of control. Approximately 20 minutes later at 9:04:35 am, Mont-Blanc exploded. The blast was the largest man-made explosion prior to the development of nuclear weapons, releasing the equivalent energy of roughly 2.9 kilotons of TNT.
Nearly all structures within an 800-metre (2,600 ft) radius, including the entire community of Richmond, were obliterated. A pressure wave snapped trees, bent iron rails, demolished buildings, grounded vessels, and scattered fragments of Mont-Blanc for kilometres. Hardly a window in the city proper survived the blast. Across the harbour, in Dartmouth, there was also widespread damage. A tsunami created by the blast wiped out the community of Mi'kmaq First Nations people who had lived in the Tuft's Cove area for generations.
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Wikipedia