Too much beer!

October 16th,1814 started off quietly,as ever at the Meux and
Company Brewery in Tottenham court Road,London. A 22 foot high vat of
strong ale stood within the brew-house containing the equivalent of
4,000 casks of beer. The vat was constructed of wood held together with
29 gigantic cast iron hoops weighing around 500 pounds each.
However,that day a workman was inspecting the vat and noticed that
there was a crack in one of the hoops. He was not unduly worried by
this discovery,as the hoops were hugely strong and he was certain that
it would hold.

Before long,disaster struck! Just one hour after the workman had
checked the vat,it exploded with a booming sound that could be heard
five miles from the scene. The contents of the vat shot out and
destroyed a adjacent vessel which contained another 2,400 barrels of
beer. This created a terrifying tidal wave of beer which demolished the
25 foot high wall around the brewery and engulfed the surrounding
streets of St.Giles which was a heavily populated slum area in which
whole families lived in single rooms,cellars or even attics. Next door
to the brewery lived a Mrs.Banfield who was,at the time,having tea with
her four year old daughter. The sudden rush of beer swept Mrs.Banfield
and her little girl out of the window. The girl was drowned,along with
a neighbour and her child. Mrs.Banfield survived her ordeal and was
found marooned on a nearby rooftop.

The chaos continued. The local pub,The Tavistock arms,the walls
crumbled and the floor collapsed beneath a barmaid and she fell into
the cellar,which was rapidly filling with beer. Amazingly,as people
were being extricated from the piles of fallen masonry,crowds of people
decided to grab the chance of a free beer bonanza,drinking from the
fast flowing gutters full of ale. People were drinking from their
cupped hands and filling as many pots and mugs as they could. This only
served to make the rescue of victims trapped in the fallen pub more
difficult. More than twelve people were crushed to death as hundreds of
people drank their fill of the beer.

The injured were taken to Middlesex hospital,were they were admitted
for treatment smelling strongly of beer. The patients already in the
hospital that had not been involved in the disaster came to the
conclusion that there was a party somewhere in the building, where beer
was being served and that they had been excluded from the fun... This
caused something of a riot and once again,chaos reigned supreme!

People were still trapped and calling for help from within their
wrecked homes well into the next evening,and the whole neighbourhood
looked like a war torn city. As bodies were finally pulled from the
rubble,they were taken away and to be layed out in a nearby house for
identification by friends and loved ones. In a fit of macabre greed,the
owner of the house started charging an admission fee for curious
onlooker to come and gawp at the victims of the tragedy. However,so
many people came along to see the spectacle that the floor collapsed
under the weight of the people crammed into such a small space and many
more people died in this further twist to an already unbelievable tale
of misfortune.

For many weeks after the disaster struck,the whole area stank
dreadfully of stale beer and although they tried,they were unable to
sucessfully pump all of the ale from the cellars and streets.The
brewery valued the lost beer at ?15,000 which seemed to be more
shocking to the press than the amount of deaths that could be
attributed to the awful accident! The final death toll came to 20, some
of which came about from alcoholic coma. An inquest was held in order
to ascertain whether anyone could be held responsible for these deaths.
The verdict of the jury was returned as 'Death by casualty'. To put it
another way,it was reckoned to be 'an act of god'.

The funerals of the victims,all of whom were poor people and had
nothing,were paid for by donations from people who left coins on top of
their coffins which were lined up in a yard... The brewery did not see
fit to pay for the burials.