Original subtitles

- Tonight on "History's Most Shocking,"

are people being swallowed by whales?

- The kayakers just happened

to be caught up in a feeding event.

[kayaker screams]

- [Tony] How did a pilot land his plane on a highway?

- He can't slow down because he may aerodynamically stall.

- [Tony] What set off

the largest non-nuclear explosion ever?

- Thousands were displaced.

Buildings crumbled as if they were paper.

- [Tony] And what inspired the inventor

who bet his life on his idea and lost?

- 80 miles an hour isn't a speed

that we can survive when we touch the ground.

[dramatic music]

- [Tony] Disasters.

- [Broadcast] Oh, the humanity!

- [Tony] Shocking video.

Life or death decisions.

Behind history's caught on camera moments...

- What to do with one dead whale.

- [Tony] Are the mysteries of how and why they happen.

- Some sort of metal fatigue was most likely at fault.

- It's like a bulldozer.

Very few buildings can actually withstand

that force of moving water.

- I'm Tony Harris.

[mountain lion roaring]

[bike revving]

Prepare to be shocked.

[dramatic music]

Good evening and welcome to "History's Most Shocking."

There are plenty of predators that lurk in the deep,

but we don't usually worry about

being swallowed alive by whales.

Well, maybe we should.

[tense music]

November 2nd, 2020, Avila Beach, California.

For best friends, Julie McSorley and Liz Cottriel,

the coastal waters off California are a great way

to see one of the most magnificent marine mammals

in its own habitat, the humpback whale.

- [Liz] Oh my goodness, you're beautiful. [gasps]

- [Tony] But once Julie and Liz get out into the bay...

- We're sitting in the kayak facing the shore,

and all of a sudden, the silver fish

were jumping into our boat,

so I thought, "This whale's really, really close.

I wonder where it's gonna come up next."

- [Tony] Suddenly, Julie and Liz are engulfed

in the jaws of a whale

[kayaker screams]

and taken underwater.

Take another look in slow motion at this footage

shot by a nearby kayak.

You can see a large humpback whale rises out of the ocean,

its mouth wide open,

appearing to swallow Julie and Liz whole.

- All I felt was the back of the boat lift up underneath me.

The mouth of the whale came up on the left

and all I thought was,

"Is this whale gonna drag us under the water?"

[dramatic music] [kayaker screams]

- [Tony] Were Julie and Liz in danger

of being this whale's next meal?

Turns out there are accounts

of whales swallowing humans in history.

- In 2021, off the coast of Cape Cod,

lobster diver Michael Packard claimed

that he ended up in the mouth of a humpback whale.

He was in there for less than a minute

before the whale spat him out.

- [Tony] And even if she knew she wasn't going to be bitten

to death by a ravenous predator like a great white shark,

Julie knew her life was still in danger.

[kayaker screaming]

- If that whale had decided to keep his mouth closed

and drag us under, drowning was a real possibility.

- After being gobbled up by a whale,

how the heck do you get out?

And why were these peaceful kayakers attacked

in the first place?

Let's see what our experts think.

[tense music]

- Tales of people being swallowed by whales

have been going for centuries,

but really, it's very unlikely

for this type of situation to actually happen.

- [Tony] Rare but possible.

In February of 1891, a man named James Bartley

was allegedly swallowed by a sperm whale

while whaling near South America.

15 hours later, so the story goes,

his shipmates caught the whale

and cut him out of its stomach.

Bartley was alive,

but bleached white by the whale's stomach acid.

[tense music]

But while a sperm whale has an esophagus big enough

to swallow a person, a humpback doesn't.

- Humpback whales are made to eat really small prey.

They don't even have teeth, they can't chew.

Because of the size of the prey that they eat,

their throats are actually about the size of a human fist.

So while you may end up in the mouth of this animal,

you're not going to be eaten by it.

- [Tony] Because of the humpback's small throat,

it just spit Julie and Liz out.

- So I was in the water tumbling around

and because we had life vests on, I popped out of the water

and then just within a couple seconds,

my friend Liz popped right up next to me.

We're good.

[tense music]

- [Tony] But if humans aren't the humpback's normal food,

why did it try to eat them in the first place?

Our experts say it was all about timing.

- You see this silvery, flashy pattern of fish

in the beginning of the video,

that's what the whale was going for.

These women were there at the wrong place at the wrong time.

- [Tony] In fact, humpback whales are known to feed

by creating what's called a bubble net.

This involves diving deep beneath a school of fish

and using bubbles from their blow holes

to stun and trap fish near the surface.

- You know, you see a big silvery school of fish,

you might want to move out of the way a little bit,

because chances are, there could be a whale also eyeing them.

[kayaker screams]

- [Tony] So, mystery solved.

By the way, if it happens to you

and the whale doesn't spit you out right away,

marine biologists recommend thrashing around

and even biting the whale to remind it you are not a fish.

As for Julie, this terrifying experience

hasn't dampened her love of the ocean.

- I'm not afraid of whales.

They're pretty harmless and I would do it all over again.

- [Liz] Oh my goodness, you're beautiful. [gasps]

[tense music]

- Our takeaway, humans aren't whale food.

But while Julie and Liz weren't in any real danger

of being swallowed, they were also fish out of water

in the whale's feeding zone.

So always be careful and respectful

when you're in an animal's natural environment.

Now, from the sea to the sky.

When your engine suddenly sputters out

while driving a car,

you can just pull over onto the shoulder

and call a tow truck.

But what if the same thing happens

to the plane you're flying?

[tense music]

July 2022 in North Carolina's Great Smoky Mountains.

Recently-licensed pilot Vincent Fraser

is taking his father-in-law

up in his Arrow Commander 100 propeller plane.

- I was pretty much brand-spanking new.

I just got my license,

had less than a hundred hours on my belt.

- [Tony] A GoPro is rolling when it happens.

The plane's engine stalls out while Vincent flies

at around 5,000 feet over the treacherous mountain terrain.

His propeller's now just being blown by the wind.

- If a plane runs out of fuel or the engine stops working,

it's not going to just fall out of the sky.

Planes are designed to glide.

So a pilot that suddenly has no power,

still has a pretty good option of gliding

to a spot for a safe landing.

- [Tony] But the clock is ticking.

Vincent must make a split-second decision

and find a safe place to land.

- We're looking for a road, we're looking for a lake,

we're looking for a river,

somewhere that we can put this aircraft down.

- [Tony] 13 seconds into the crisis, he spots it.

A highway that, though winding, is at least relatively wide

and not too busy.

- The chances of surviving that

were a lot better than going in that river.

My father-in-law is staying calm.

I look at him and I apologize,

and I said, "I'm sorry" and then, "I love you."

And then he just looked at me and he said, "I love you too.

I know you can do this, just get us down safely."

- I have to admit I was holding my breath during this video.

[suspenseful music]

- Possibly the largest plane to ever attempt

a highway landing was Southern Airways flight 242.

On April 4th, 1977, the DC-9 lost thrust in both engines

during a thunderstorm and tried to set down

on a state route in Georgia.

Unfortunately, the plane crashed

after its left wing clipped a gas station,

killing 72 people.

So why did Vincent's engine fail

and how did he manage to land safely?

[tense music]

First things first, what went wrong with the engine?

- He loses thrust.

There's a problem with the fuel going into the engine.

Why wasn't fuel coming into the engine?

What's most common is either a pilot taking off

with not enough fuel in the wing tanks,

or if there's water in the fuel,

it could contaminate the fuel.

- [Tony] Many airplanes primarily use wing fuel tanks

since they can help balance and stabilize the craft.

Water can get in through leaks and seals,

poorly fitting fuel caps, and by condensation,

especially when the tank isn't full.

So a fueling failure seems to be the most likely culprit.

But in the moment of crisis,

Vincent has a bigger question on his mind.

How is he going to land?

And 63 seconds after the initial engine failure,

as he's approaching the highway, he notices a big problem.

- [Vincent] I was just skirting over the power lines,

so I knew I had to kind of hold it, hold it, hold it,

and then push the nose down to get under those power lines,

'cause up ahead, I could see another set of power lines.

So I pushed down and I'm trying to line up

to get under the next set of power lines.

- [Tony] At a minute, 14 seconds in,

he realizes the power lines aren't his only obstacle.

- Now there's cars literally going right underneath me,

and they're probably a few feet in my propeller.

I'm just trying to manage this aircraft

in a space that's maybe 10 feet.

- He can't slow down to land behind those cars

because he may aerodynamically stall.

Not only that, those two cars can't see him

because he's behind them,

so he allows the cars to pass underneath him.

He continues his airspeed so he doesn't stall.

He flies over those two cars

and then begins to set down on the highway.

- [Tony] Finally, one minute, 45 seconds into the emergency,

Vincent lands, allowing the cars to see him and brake.

- [Vincent] I put the wheels down right at the curb,

and that's when you can hear that the tire's just squealing.

And so now it's bouncing. It's very violent.

- [Tony] And he's still not out of a danger zone.

- [Jeff] There's now cars heading towards him

on the opposite side of their highway.

But at least they're facing him

and they can steer away from him.

The highway suddenly curves, so he has to use his brakes

and his flight controls to maintain a landing and curving.

- [Tony] Two minutes and 11 seconds into the ordeal,

Vincent finally comes to a complete and safe stop.

[thrilling music]

A subsequent investigation confirms Guzzetti's suspicions.

There was a problem with the fuel.

- [Tony] Vincent says it turns out his engine

was burning more fuel per hour than the standard rate,

so he miscalculated how much he actually needed.

Then the broken gauge failed to register this shortage,

so he knows he's lucky to be alive.

- It was like an out-of-body experience,

and I know it might sound crazy,

but I felt like I was outside the aircraft

and I could see everything so vividly.

It was just a miracle, really.

- Our takeaway,

a bad gauge failed to indicate the fuel shortage,

but Vincent's decision not to pull up

and slow down his plane may have saved his

and his passenger's lives.

Vincent, good flying.

- If you were to take all of the railroad tracks

in the United States and lay them into end,

they'd circle the Earth more than five times.

But not all American railroad tracks are created equal.

As you'll see, some are more dangerous than others.

[tense music]

June 25th, 2021, Moody, Texas.

It's just the end of another typical workday as Amandine Hou

and her brother are closing up their donut shop.

- We started cleaning, taking everything into the kitchen,

getting ready to leave,

and that's when my brother called me.

It just happened so quickly.

- [Recorder] Oh my goodness.

[train horn blaring]

(bleep).

- [Tony] Outside their shop,

cell phone video captures the moment.

A semi-truck is stranded on the train tracks

and the timing couldn't be worse.

[train horn blaring]

- [Recorder] No, he can't stop, stop!

Oh my gosh, oh my goodness.

Oh my goodness.

[crashing]

- [Tony] Another camera on the other side

of the tracks captures the same moment.

[train horn blaring]

[crashing]

Even more shocking, this has happened twice before

outside Amandine's shop.

- It was 2018 that we saw the first train collision

and it was pretty scary actually,

'cause it was full of car batteries.

- [Tony] And it's not just this unlucky spot.

The trucks versus train thing happens all over the world,

and the winner is the same almost every time.

- One of the things with the crossing gates is,

if they're up, then that would be a malfunction

of the gates when the train's coming,

and that can lead to train-vehicle impact.

But the second thing is that sometimes people try,

'cause no one wants to wait for a train,

people try to go around the gates,

and in fact, trying to go around the gate

will lead to a terrible train crash.

- According to the Federal Railroad Administration,

a train strikes a vehicle or a person every three hours.

With that many crashes,

we have a serious national problem on our hands.

But apart from figuring out how this accident happened,

what's even more puzzling is, why does it keep happening

at this particular crossing?

[tense music]

Today, at most crossings, sensors typically activate

crossing signals about 30 seconds

before the train arrives.

So did those sensors fail here?

The evidence is right there on the video.

- The gates in this video appear to be working,

because they came down on the truck

that was already occupying the crossing.

In fact, it's very rare to have

gates and lights protection go bad.

- [Tony] Further investigation reveals the problem

isn't the crossing mechanism, it's the crossing itself.

- So you've got a truck and trailer stopped on the tracks.

The front and back wheels are not in contact

with the road the way they should be

because there's something in the middle

that's lifted up or is preventing that movement.

- [Tony] In this case, the slope of the road on either side

of the train tracks leaves trucks vulnerable

to what is known as high-centering on the tracks.

That's when the trailer gets caught on high points

between two lower ones

and the wheels no longer have traction.

- Typically, there's some sort of signage

to let the truck drivers know

that there's a potential for low clearance.

- [Tony] In case you're wondering,

the driver got out before the collision.

We believe that's him there.

Apparently, he didn't see the signs

even though they were present.

- So what went wrong in the Texas case

is that the driver didn't realize how much clearance

he didn't have to get over the tracks.

- [Tony] And to keep it from happening again.

Quimby says there's a fix.

- Most railroads were built long before the roads,

and therefore the vehicles on both the roads

and the railroads have changed.

The permanent solution will be for whoever owns that road

to recontour the approaches to the track

to make it a little bit less steep.

[tense music]

- The takeaway, this accident was caused by high-centering.

We'll check back with Amandine

to see if this continues to be a problem.

But let's hope whoever owns the land around the crossing,

railroad, town, or county, decides to level it out.

Moving on.

When you're in trouble on the high seas,

the Coast Guard is almost always able to answer the call.

Most of those rescues go smoothly.

Others go like this.

[tense music]

February 3rd, 2023, the Coast Guard

receives a mayday cold just off the Oregon Coast.

- They send out a couple of 47-foot motor life boats

to see what's going on,

and when they get there, they see this boat in distress.

- [Tony] Coast Guard operations include everything

from medical emergencies to boat fires and capsized vessels,

covering more than 95,000 miles of US coastline.

- It's a very elite unit.

These are highly, highly skilled seamen and mariners.

- [Tony] And this rescue appears to need some help

from some air power.

- This yacht is just tossing and turning in the seas,

and the seas are so rough they actually can't rescue

the lone person who's on board.

- [Tony] So the Coast Guard dispatches a chopper.

One of their rescue swimmers is lowered down

into the stormy waters and swims toward the troubled vessel.

But just as he nears the boat,

a massive wall of water barrels down.

Let's see that again.

Watch how the gigantic wave slams into the boat,

which tumbles over and over on top of the crest.

- [Josh] This area is called the Graveyard of the Pacific.

It goes from Tillamook Bay in Oregon

to the top of Vancouver Island in Canada.

But the worst part is where the Columbia River spills out

into the Pacific.

Where those two currents of water meet is chaos.

Exactly where this happened.

- [Tony] Will this unlucky yachtsman even survive?

Or is the Graveyard of the Pacific

about to claim another victim?

- This guy was about to be another statistic

when things start to get crazy.

- [Tony] The region off the Oregon coast

known as the Graveyard of the Pacific

is living up to its nickname.

As you can see, the man on this boat is in mortal peril.

The Coast Guard has arrived to save him,

but right then, a massive wave flips the boat

like a bathtub toy.

The graveyard of the Pacific has claimed

more than 2,000 vessels since the 1700s.

But how dangerous was this specific situation

and what happened to the people on board?

[tense music]

First, how bad was the danger to the boat

when the Coast Guard arrived?

- He got out to sea

and apparently the engines failed,

which means you lose control of the craft.

In a situation like that with no power,

you're completely at the mercy of the ocean.

The best thing you can do is call for help

as soon as you can.

- [Tony] Without engine power and proper steering,

Turner says the boat couldn't do what it needed to

in this kind of emergency.

- What you want to do is hit the wave, bow on.

In that particular video,

it's like the worst possible condition

because he's literally sideways to a wave,

which means it's going to crash over and push you over.

[intense music]

- [Tony] But Turner notes, the man did make

one smart decision in the heat of the moment,

to abandon ship.

- You can see the sailor on the back on the deck.

Most ships when they capsize don't automatically

flip back up the right way.

So if a ship capsizes, the best you can hope for

is that you don't get trapped inside the ship.

[tense music]

Fortunately, the rescue diver was able to ground

and ultimately hoist him aboard the Jayhawk helicopter.

- [Tony] So the rescuer and rescuee are safe,

but there's one more question

you may have been asking earlier.

What was this boat doing out there to begin with?

- As this story starts to unfold,

we learn that this is not exactly a model citizen.

Jericho Wolf Labonte

was actually a fugitive from the law.

Labonte was apparently wanted for incidents in Oregon

and also as far away as Canada, where he was from.

- [Tony] Jericho had allegedly stolen this yacht,

but unfortunately for him,

he chose one of the worst possible escape route.

- They call this the Graveyard of the Pacific

for a reason, because it's so notoriously dangerous.

[tense music]

- The takeaway, this capsizing was caused

by the yacht's vulnerable position relative to the waves.

After the incident, Jericho Labonte was dried off,

taken into custody, and among other things,

was formally charged with first-degree theft

and second-degree criminal mischief.

The yacht, on the other hand, became another casualty

of the Graveyard of the Pacific.

Now, let's turn up the heat.

Any animal, including humans, will do anything

to escape being burned alive.

Here, that fear becomes a reality, and when it happens,

some deep-seated survival instincts kick.

[tense music]

March 25th, 2014. Houston, Texas.

At 12:38, firefighter Brad Hawthorne and his crew

pull up to a burning apartment complex

still under construction.

The clock's already ticking.

[tense music]

- You got minutes to try to get this thing under control.

- [Tony] The firefighters learn

that construction supervisor Curtis Reissig is trapped

after trying to put out a small fire on the roof.

Within four and a half minutes,

they've raised their aerial ladder,

- Started heading up the ladder, looking for the guy on the roof.

There was fire everywhere down the whole roof line.

- [Tony] Then, five minutes into the operation...

[firefighter whistles]

- [Tony] the driver at the bottom of the ladder,

who's wearing video glasses,

spots Curtis on a top floor balcony.

[tense music]

- We started to move the ladder towards the balcony.

Our aerial ladder wasn't extended enough

to reach him on the fifth floor, so I was on the very tip.

- [Tony] Meanwhile, an office worker in a building

across the street captures footage of Curtis

that goes viral because of what happens next.

- [Recorder] He can't get out, OMG.

- [Tony] As the flames get closer, our experts say

the temperatures are already life-threatening.

- The heat coming off of there had to have been incredible,

probably 5-600 degrees at least.

- [Tony] At about 118 degrees Fahrenheit,

human skin begins to sustain first-degree burns.

So six minutes in, Curtis has to make a risky decision.

- [Recorder] Oh God, oh God, oh God, oh God.

Oh my God. [others screaming]

Oh no, oh no, oh no.

[people clamoring]

- Time is running out for our imperiled construction worker.

Fire will kill you, of course, and jumping from one balcony

to another is also exceedingly dangerous.

But how did this fire spread so fast

and how could Curtis possibly manage to get out alive?

[tense music]

First, how he got out.

At six minutes and 15 seconds in, Curtis jumps.

- [Recorder] Oh no. Oh no.

Oh! [people exclaiming]

- [Tony] And luckily, he sticks the landing.

- As he was swinging, his hands kind of pulled off

and he just had to let go and land

and just go turn to Jell-O, if you will,

so he wouldn't fall backwards.

- [Tony] Yet, the ladder to safety

is still dozens of feet away.

- [Recorder] They need to get him.

- They made a point to go above the victim

and bring the ladder down as opposed to going

below the victim and raising the ladder up.

That's important because when someone is panicked

and scared, they might just jump down on the ladder,

and you don't want them to do that.

- [Tony] Finally, six minutes and 45 seconds

into the operation, the ladder arrives

and Curtis reaches over.

- [Recorder] Hell yes.

Oh, thank Jesus. Thank you, God.

- [Tony] If you watch the reflections

in the office window, you can see workers turning away

and walking back to their cubicles.

They think it's all over, but both men are still in danger.

- [Tony] And seven minutes and 10 seconds in...

- [Recorder] Oh no, oh my God!

- [Tony] Part of the building's fifth floor collapses.

Curtis escapes with some minor burns to his face and hands.

- [Recorder] They got him.

- [Tony] Soon after, the investigation began

into how the fire started.

- It's believed that it was a welding issue where it sparked

and because the building wasn't completed,

a lot of the material is very flammable.

[tense music]

The reason it's traveling so fast

is because the wind is so great.

Oxygen is what the fire needs,

and when the wind is blowing,

along with all the other flammable material,

it will continue to engulf everything in its path.

- In a situation like this where the building is open,

high winds can make the fire grow from something small

and manageable, to out of control like this very quickly.

[intense music]

- [Tony] One thing's for sure.

The hoses may have been shut off after the fire was extinguished,

but Curtis' gratitude continues to flow.

- We've invited him to the station a couple times.

I mean, he's probably one of the few

that I've ever really kept up since a fire like that.

[tense music]

- The takeaway, the quick thinking and heroic actions

of both Curtis and the firefighters

saved the construction supervisor's life.

As for what started the blaze,

while that welding theory seems logical to our experts,

the exact cause has never been determined.

- Beirut is home to a bustling port,

one of the busiest in the Eastern Mediterranean.

It receives more than 2,000 ships every year.

But unfortunately, this commercial shipping hub

is now best known for something tragic.

[tense music]

August 4th, 2020.

It is a peaceful summer afternoon in Beirut, Lebanon.

People are shooting video all around the city.

A young couple is taking wedding pictures in Saifi Village

in the city's central district.

Meanwhile, another couple is jet-skiing

out in Saint George Bay.

And in the suburb of Hazmieh, tour guide Karim Sokhn

is working at his bike shop.

At 5:45 PM, a fire breaks out in a warehouse

in the port of Beirut.

As thick smoke billows into the sky,

these people start recording.

And then, without warning, just after six...

[recorder shouting] [explosions booming]

[glass shattering] [explosions booming]

A huge explosion rocks the entire city.

- [Tony] Take another look.

That initial white cloud is called a condensation,

or Wilson cloud.

It's produced when a shockwave condenses

the water vapor and humid air.

What's left behind when it dissipates

is a giant red and orange cloud.

[explosion booming]

- [Tony] Rumors begin to circulate

that the explosion was the of a missile attack.

Is that what really happened, or was it something else?

[explosion booming]

One study found the explosion to be the equivalent

of 1.1 kilotons of TNT.

That's enough to destroy a city block.

We asked our experts to get to the bottom

of this terrifying situation.

[tense music]

First, let's dispense with the conspiracy theories.

The missile rumors were false.

- We have satellite power that we could have seen

a drone or a missile go into that area,

and we would see if something was coming in.

- [Tony] Instead, Hickey says all the evidence

points directly to a well-known

and dangerous explosive substance.

- In November of 2013, we have a Russian ship carrying

approximately 2,700 metric tons of ammonium nitrate,

and they dock in the Beirut area.

They can't pay their fee for docking,

so they're ordered to unload their ship.

- [Tony] They unload that cargo into a warehouse.

Ammonium nitrate is a chemical typically used

in fertilizers, and under certain circumstances,

it becomes explosive.

[explosion booming]

And this is not the first time this has happened.

In April 1947, 2,300 tons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer

that was loaded onto a French cargo ship exploded

and set off a huge chain reaction of fires

and even a tidal wave in the port of Texas City, Texas.

[tense music]

- That bag of ammonium nitrate can literally sit there

all day long unless something is being introduced into it.

And what was being introduced to it

was heat, shock, and friction.

- [Tony] And Hickey knows just where that extreme heat,

shock, and friction originated.

- What we hear early on are loud pops,

[distant popping]

and I would say that those are fireworks going off.

- [Tony] A former port worker says fireworks

were being stored in the same warehouse

as the ammonium nitrate.

And if that wasn't bad enough,

this warehouse also contained the jugs of kerosene, oil,

and five miles of blast fuses used in mining operations.

Something sparked it.

[tense music]

This initial fire and smoke is what people were filming

when the flames hit the ammonium nitrate

and ignited the blast.

Potentially the largest

non-nuclear explosion in history.

[explosion booming]

The force was enough to knock people over.

- When sufficient energy is imparted

to molecules of the atmosphere from a shockwave,

even though we're talking about gas in motion,

it can feel on your body as if you're being tackled

by a full-bodied football player.

[explosion booming] [glass shattering]

- [Tony] Ultimately,

the explosion killed more than 200 people,

injured well over 6,000,

and caused billions of dollars of damage.

- The takeaway, the Beirut port explosion was caused

by careless storage of ammonium nitrate.

Yet more than three years later, no one responsible

for the negligence has been brought to justice.

- Now, it's time for our throwback segment.

And in this case, way back to 1912.

The age of aviation is in its infancy, and over in Paris,

one daring man was hoping his own dreams could take flight.

Suffice it to say, things didn't go as planned.

[tense music]

February 4th, 1912, Paris, France.

Tailor-turned-inventor Franz Reichelt arrives

at the 1,024-foot tall Eiffel Tower

to put his new low-altitude, wearable parachute suit

to the test.

Reichelt stands on a ledge about 200 feet in the air,

spreads his arms,

and looks over his suit for any riffs or tears.

Then, he turns and places his foot over the ledge,

peering down at the ground below.

After a long hesitation, his breath visible in the cold air,

Reichelt jumps, his parachute flapping behind him.

[tense music]

- Mr. Reichelt was born in Austria in 1878.

He moved to Paris in his adult life

and became a well-known tailor.

And with the dawn of the airplane,

he looks to the skies as the future.

As airplanes continue to fly, airplanes also crashed.

And pilots needed to leap out of their airplanes

while they were crashing,

but the parachutes of the day were not equipped

to handle these low-altitude jumps,

and a lot of these pilots would end up dying.

- [Tony] Reichelt becomes obsessed

with finding a solution,

so he starts testing prototypes on dummies,

but with minimal success.

- Reichelt was under the impression

that if he could jump from someplace higher,

the chute would deploy.

So he begins petitioning the Paris police, and they say,

"Yep, you could throw a dummy off the Eiffel Tower."

- [Tony] Reichelt ignores that stipulation about the dummy

and instead decides to test his invention on himself.

- [MJ] And much like the dummies in his previous tests,

his parachute suit did not work properly,

and unfortunately, he perished as a result.

- Nobody can say for certain why Franz Reichelt

was in such a rush to test his invention on himself.

Some say he was racing to beat the expiration of his patent,

or that he was desperate to win prize money

promised for the first successful safety parachute.

Whatever his motivation, we're still left asking

why didn't his device work?

[tense music]

First, an important distinction.

This wasn't a parachute.

Reichelt had actually created something closer

to a wingsuit.

- The way wingsuits work is what you're trying to do

is create enough surface area to convert the air speed

that you build when you jump off the cliff

into forward flight.

- [Tony] Even with modern wingsuits,

there's still a huge component of risk.

Some sources estimate

that one in 500 wingsuit base jumps result in a casualty.

But what specifically went wrong with Reichelt's design?

- Franz is jumping from about 200 feet.

I wouldn't even consider opening the most modern wingsuit

I own at the height that he's jumping from.

I think Franz is hoping his suit will slow him down

like a parachute would.

Unfortunately, his design was not only not big enough,

but was not secure enough to maintain its shape

and create enough drag to slow him down.

- [Tony] Still, despite the misguided attempt,

Shapiro can understand and respect

what motivates men like Reichelt.

- For me, the idea of being able to jump off a cliff

and fly away using my arms,

it's more like flying in my dreams.

But in this case, although I commend his bravery,

the intention was good, but the execution not so good.

[tense music]

- Our takeaway, Franz Reichelt's design wasn't aerodynamic,

and his jump off the Eiffel Tower was too low

to give his device enough time to open.

Would it have worked if he had jumped

from a higher altitude?

That, we may never know.

And maybe that's a good thing.

- Bridge technology dates back

to 4,000 BC in ancient Babylon.

But a recent tragedy in India is proof

that we still have plenty to learn.

[tense music]

It's just after 6:30 PM on October 30th, 2022

in the city of Morbi in Gujarat, India.

Scores of people are celebrating the last night

of the Diwali holiday on a cable suspension footbridge

known as the Jhulto Pul, or hanging bridge,

which stretches more than 750 feet

across the Machchhu River.

The revelers are chatting, swaying back and forth,

and taking photos when suddenly, disaster strikes.

[metal rattling] [people screaming]

[intense music]

Eyewitnesses say the aftermath of the event is pure chaos.

- [Tony] This isn't the first time a bridge has collapsed.

It brings to mind the deadly incident

on a much larger suspension bridge in December 1967.

It happened here in the US.

- The Silver Bridge which spans over the Ohio River

had a cracked bar,

which eventually caused the bridge to collapse.

Unfortunately, 46 people perished in this event.

- [Tony] The Silver Bridge tragedy led to

federal regulations and an increased emphasis on safety,

which endures to this day.

But while that bridge disaster could be ascribed

to simple neglect,

this collapse in India is more of a puzzle.

Although the bridge in Morbi was about 140 years old,

it had just been renovated and reopened.

- It's shocking to know

that the Jhulto Pul Bridge collapsed only five days

after the repair was done to the bridge.

[metal rattling] [people screaming]

[splashing] [tense music]

- This bridge was originally constructed

during the British colonization of India.

The local king built it to connect two of his palaces.

When this tragedy occurred,

the bridge had just reopened early

after months of maintenance.

So how and why did a bridge

that was just fixed suddenly collapse?

[tense music]

First, let's go back to basics.

Just how is a suspension bridge supposed to work?

- Suspension bridges have primarily three components.

There is the super structure,

which in this case includes the towers, the bridge deck,

and then the suspension cables that attach

to the towers down to the bridge deck.

Underneath the super structure is the substructure,

which are the columns which support it,

and then transfer the load down to the third component,

which is the foundation.

[metal rattling]

- [Tony] So what went wrong in this case?

Didn't the recent renovation make the bridge stronger?

- The team found that there was old suspension cables

that were welded to new suspension cables.

And afterwards, there was no load testing

prior to reopening the bridge.

And then there was cable corrosion

on the upstream side of the bridge.

22 were already corroded and likely broken

before the remaining 27 wires snapped.

[metal rattling] [people screaming]

- [Tony] These problems were compounded

by careless oversight and old-fashioned overloading.

- At the time of the collapse,

there were about 300 people on a bridge

that was only designed to really carry 100 to 150 people.

- [Tony] At least 135 people died or went missing,

while around 180 survivors were rescued from the river.

It could have been much worse.

- The bridge is 50 feet above the water.

When you take an average adult

and let them drop 50 feet in the air,

their body's traveling about 38 miles per hour

when they hit the water.

As they enter into the water,

they are vulnerable to really potentially fatal injuries.

- [Tony] And even those who survive the fall

had to survive the water.

- [Lisa] A lot of the people who did not survive

were the young kids and the elderly.

And I would guess that a number of people probably drowned

because they couldn't swim.

[tense music]

- The takeaway, the Jhulto Pul Bridge was overloaded

and its cables were improperly repaired.

Nine people were arrested on charges of culpable homicide.

And as of 2024, the bridge has not been rebuilt.

And that's our show for tonight.

Thank you so much for watching and stay safe out there.