What caused the Halifax Explosion?

Answer 1

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The Halifax explosion was when a ship came into port and a colision caused it to blow up in the port of Halifax.

At 9 AM in 1917 the Halifax Explosoin happened because a ship, (the Mont Blanc carrying explocives) caught on fire because the ship Imo (pronounced: EE-mo) accidentally hit it because they had poor communications. Mont Blanc caught on fire and drifted into port, it exploded soon after.

The blast was so strong it blew windows out of houses all the way back to Dartmouth, and the shock was felt in Sydney 250 miles away. Because of this 200 people were blinded. 25,000 lost their homes. 9,000 people were injured and more than 3,000 were killed.

Answer 2

The French steamship Mont Blanc was carrying 2366 tons of wet & dry picric acid, 250 tons of TNT, 62 tons of gun cotton and 246 tons of benzol and monochlorobenzol when it collided with the Norwegian relief vessel Imo in Halifax Harbour on December 6, 1917. Laura MacDonald, in her excellent book "Curse of the Narrows", devotes a chapter to the science of the explosion.

Based on the testimony of chemist Willard C. Cope at the official trials that followed the disaster, and the study of naval explosives expert Pierre Pelletier, MacDonald concludes that the explosion was inevitable after grains of dry picric acid were ignited by sparks from the collision between the two ships. That small fire ignited benzol and monochlorobenzol vapours leaking from poorly sealed barrels on deck. It was likely the heavier monoclorobenzol vapours that carried the fire downward to the lower deck where fuel was stored. The fuel erupted within minutes of the collision, superheating the ship's hull and vaporizing the water in the wet picric acid and guncotton stored inside the sealed holds. At the same time, the barrels of benzol and monochlorobenzol were exploding like rockets, sailing high into the air and crashing back to the deck. Either the pressure of the superheated air indside the holds and/or the shock of the exploding benzol finally caused a keg of the normally stable dry picric acid to explode, triggering the remainder of the cargo.

An estimated 5.85 million pounds of explosives exploded, shattering the 6.9 million pounds of the ship's steel superstructure, which was propelled like shrapnel across miles of terrain. In all, over 2000 people were killed (the names of 1950 are known but there were hundreds unidentified), 9000 wounded and a large section of Halifax was flattened with damage totalling over $500 milllion in current dollars. With a force equivalent to an estimated 3 kilotons TNT the explosion was the largest pre-nuclear explosion and is still the largest accidental explosion in history.

Answer 3

It occured near the "Narrows", which is the narrowest part of Halifax Harbour, where the harbour proper joins with Bedford Basin. That's where the MacKay bridge is now. The actual point of the explosion was at Pier 6, which is now part of the Halifax Shipyard complex, just south of the bridge. There is a monument to the explosion in Fort Needham park. The large tower, which is meant to resemble a broken wall, has an opening: if you stand behind it and look through the gap you are looking directly at the site of the explosion.

Answer 4

The collision of a French munition ship (Mont Blanc) and a Belgian relief ship (Imo) in the "Narrows" on December 6th, 1917. ~2,000 people died, and ~9,000 people were injured.