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CASE #6U8WI1 · 2 entities · 1 connections
The Great Molasses Flood
A wave of molasses moving 35 miles an hour killed 21 people in Boston in 1919 — and it's a real, documented engineering disaster, not a joke.
On January 15, 1919, a massive steel tank holding 2.3 million gallons of molasses burst in Boston's North End, sending a 25-foot wave of syrup through the streets at an estimated 35 miles per hour. It killed 21 people and injured 150, and became a landmark case in American engineering regulation.
✓documented
Quick facts
- →The wave was estimated at 25 feet high and moving around 35 miles per hour when the tank first burst.
- →It killed 21 people and injured about 150, some of whom were trapped as the molasses thickened in the cold.
- →The tank had been leaking and making rumbling noises for years before it failed; the company had painted it brown to hide the leaks rather than fix them.
- →The resulting lawsuit was one of the first in the U.S. to rely on professional engineering testimony, helping establish stricter construction regulation.
Entities on file
Great Molasses Flood (event)
1919 Boston disaster in which a burst molasses tank killed 21 people; became a landmark engineering liability case.
No outgoing connections on file.
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Purity Distilling Company (organization)
Owner of the molasses tank; found liable for the disaster due to structural defects.
→ owned the tank responsible for → Great Molasses Flood✓documented