Halifax

[bart592]

Does anybody know ?

Are there any photographs or pictures of the French ship Mont Blanc before the Explosion in Halifax

Bart

[Peter Beckett]

Bart,

try this site

Peter

Halifax

[Muerrisch]

an interesting site, and it makes an interesting claim which may be false: to say it was biggest man-made explosion before atomic bomb leaves aside the destruction of the bomb dump at RAF Fauld in November 1944, which certainly grossed more HE and, being of a later generation, was probably more powerful.

[Broznitsky]

RAF Fauld in November 1944, which certainly grossed more HE and, being of a later generation, was probably more powerful.

But did Fauld cause as much loss of life and utter devastation to a city?

[Adrian Roberts]

Surely if 1900 died in the Halifax explosion, would this be the biggest loss of life from a single non-nuclear explosion, even if the amount of explosive material was larger in some cases? Could the casualties in some the mine explosions on the Western Front such as Lochnagar [La Boiselle] have been more - I've seen differing estimates. And I have a vague idea that there was a munitions ship explosion in the Far East in WW2 that caused huge loss of life.

Adrian

[Muerrisch]

But did Fauld cause as much loss of life and utter devastation to a city?

No, certainly not: but I am interested in big bangs ....... one might as well claim Passchendaele as causing more loss of life or devastation of a huge area: not logical. My guess is that the people making claims for Halifax discovered Fauld and added a clause about devastation and casualties!

Mind you, Fauld altered the Geography in a big way, I expect some of the rocks are still in orbit.