Lest We Forget

[tvordlj]

87 years ago, two ships collided in the Halifax Harbour. One of them was full of explosives which caught fire. The result was the largest and most devastating man made explosion before the nuclear age. The north end of Halifax and Dartmouth were leveled, 2000 people died and nearly 10,000 were injured or blinded. The shockwave was felt as far away as Truro, 60 miles, where dishes rattled on shelves. The day after the explosion, the city was hit with a winter blizzard. There aren't many survivors left, those that still remember are now elderly. December 6 might be the "day of infamy" for the U.S. when Pearl Harbour was attacked, and it might be the anniversary of when a very disturbed Marc Lepine shot 14 women in a university in Montreal in the early 1990's but today Halifax remembers it's own disaster, predating both of those events.

The CBC has an excellent interactive website here, http://www.cbc.ca/halifaxexplosion/

There's a good written description here. http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/kylet1/halifax.htm

Comments

[abishag.livejournal.com]

I knew about the explosion and the devastation, but had forgotten the date if I ever knew it.

[tvor.livejournal.com]

They are very good here about commemorating it, with a ceremony by the outside memorial that they have on a hill overlooking the site. Last year the CBC produced a dramatization of a novel based about the explosion which was quite good, if not quite historically accurate in some areas but then, it's *fiction*. There have been good documentaries on it over the years and last year the CBC did up their snazzy website to coincide with their new fictionalized production. It's quite good though, with lots of information and maps.

It's also the reason Nova Scotia sends the City of Boston a huge Christmas tree for their city center every year in thanks for their speedy response sending a train full of supplies and medical assistance the very next day. The province has been doing that for about 35 or 40 years.