In fact, they reported that they had received a menacing phone call just one year earlier from an individual who threatened to blow up the tank.Īs the lawsuits stacked up against USIA and Purity Distillery, experts examined the holding tank. They claimed that foreign, likely Italian, anarchists had planted a bomb in the holding tank as an act of sabotage. Officials from the USIA noted that about 80% of the molasses they produced was used for making munitions and gunpowder. The United States Industrial Alcohol (USIA), the overseer of the Purity Distilling Company, was quick to deflect the blame for the flood. Some victims were not chiseled out of the molasses for days. In the days after the flood, periodic shots rang out as clean-up crews euthanized trapped horses. In all, 21 people died in the molasses flood and more than 150 people were injured. They were able to rescue all but one of their brothers, who drowned in the sticky molasses. Rescuers spent hours cutting through the ruined building to reach the trapped men. The second floor of the station collapsed, trapping a group of firefighters who were eating their lunch at the time. The Engine 31 firehouse was close to the molasses tank and was knocked off its foundation by the flood. Victims encased in the cooling molasses had little time before they suffocated.įirefighters turned their rescue efforts into saving their fellow firefighters. The molasses, which had been hot when it was poured in the holding tank, was thin and more fluid as it flooded the streets, but now, the cooler temperatures were causing the molasses to thicken to a near-solid state. Their rescue efforts were hampered by the nature of the flood. They were soon joined by Boston police and fire departments. They rushed to the scene to help, pulling victims from the goo. The USS Nantucket, a training ship, was docked nearby and the soldiers on board witnessed the disaster. Soldiers Rushed to Help the Police and Firefighters
#Great molasses flood quiz free
The Boston Post printed an eye-witness report of the time saying that, amid the waist-deep sludge, he could see living creatures struggling to free themselves from the thick, brown muck, but that it was impossible to tell if they were humans, dogs, or horses. In the molasses tsunami’s wake was a half a mile of destruction…splintered houses, dead bodies, injured horses, and buried carriages.
Electrical poles snapped, as did the steel supports of the nearby elevated train platform. The force of the molasses crumpled several buildings and pushed others off their foundations. People and horses were swallowed up by the brown wall. The people of Boston had little time to ponder the strange noise a 15-foot tall wall of brown, bubbling molasses barreled down on the city at 35-miles per hour. Just after lunch time, at about 12:40 in the afternoon, a sudden, loud, metallic sound rang out and the ground shook. Temperatures were especially warm for January…over 40-degrees.
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