The Halifax Explosion - 15 to 20 seconds after.
(Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)
I have had a fascination with the Titanic sinking ever since the wreck was discovered at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean by Dr. Robert Ballard in 1985. I got my hands on every single book I could find about the Titanic and read them, as well as finding every single film about the sinking. This interest in the most famous maritime disaster in history made me want to look at other maritime disasters. One that I came across was the Halifax Explosion of 1917, which occurred in Halifax harbor in Nova Scotia, Canada and was caused by the collision of two ships. It was one of the deadliest disasters in Canadian history.
During World War I many ships carried ammunition for the war effort. Vessels, during the war, could not make a direct voyage across the Atlantic Ocean because of the possibility of being stranded in the middle of the ocean with a German submarine lurking nearby. The French ship S.S. Mont Blanc was under orders to carry ammunition from New York to Bordeaux, France. The Mont Blanc followed close to the coastline of the United States, then Canada, making the most dangerous part of the journey across from Iceland to Europe. One of the ports that the Mont Blanc stopped at was Halifax. The Mont Blanc was carrying TNT, gun cotton, benzol and picric acid, all highly dangerous explosives. It was so dangerous that crew members were not allowed to smoke anywhere on the ship.
Any ship entering Halifax Harbor had to pass McNabs Island and then enter what was called the “narrows”, a thin strip of water that separated the town of Halifax to the south and Dartmouth to the north. The narrows involved following strict shipping lane procedures. To understand this, think of our highways and how we always drive on the right side of the road. Ships entering the narrows were supposed to travel up the right side of the narrows when entering, and when exiting, were supposed to go along the right side, closer to Halifax, when going out to sea.
Map of Halifax Harbor
(Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)
On the morning of December 6, 1917, the Mont Blanc entered the narrows going toward Bedford Basin, which was a body of water with only one entrance and exit, through the narrows. A Norwegian ship called the S.S. Imo was entering the narrows in the opposite direction, going away from Bedford Basin. The Imo was chartered to pick up a cargo of relief supplies from Belgium and deliver them to New York and was continuing its journey. The Imo encountered an American tramp steamer S.S. Clara traveling toward Bedford Basin, up the wrong side of the narrows closer to Halifax. Through shipping blasts, the two ships agreed to pass each other starboard to starboard, which caused the Imo to have to shift its lane closer to the Mont Blanc, coming from the opposite direction.
As the Mont-Blanc headed towards Bedford Basin through the narrows on the Dartmouth side, the harbor master Francis Mackey, kept watch on the shipping traffic between Halifax and Dartmouth. He spotted the Imo and became concerned as the ship appeared to be heading towards the Mont Blanc’s starboard side, as if to cut the ship off. Mackey gave a short blast of his ship's signal whistle to indicate that he had the right of way but was met with two short blasts from Imo, indicating that the approaching vessel would not yield. Captain Aime Le Medec ordered the Mont-Blanc to halt her engines and angle slightly to starboard, closer to the Dartmouth side of the narrows. He let out another single blast of his whistle, hoping the Imo would move to starboard, but was again met with a double blast.
Aime Le Medec - Captain of the Mont Blanc
(Courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)
When the collusion was imminent, both ships cut their engines, but it was too late. The two ships collided with each other at roughly 8:45am at a low speed of about one knot. The Imo’s forward hull struck the front starboard side of the Mont Blanc. The impact damaged canisters of benzol that were stored on deck, which fell over and started leaking vapors. The Imo reversed its engines to pull itself out of the damaged Mont Blanc. When that occurred, the situation was made even worse because of metal scraping against metal, causing sparks to fly, igniting the vapors from the benzol. This set off a fire that grew out of control quickly. Black smoke enveloped the entire ship, and the captain ordered all crewmembers to abandon ship. They lowered themselves in two lifeboats, leaving no one on the ship, and rowed towards Dartmouth. The Mont Blanc, on fire, drifted toward Halifax and beached itself at Pier 6 near Richmond Street.
The Norwegian ship Imo aground on the Dartmouth shore.
(Wikipedia Commons)
The collision occurred in the morning when many people were walking to work, and children were walking to school. The collision of the two ships and Mont Blanc being on fire caused a spectacle for many to see in the town. People walked toward the docks on the narrows to see the great ship on fire. What they didn’t understand was that the Mont Blanc was laden with high explosives.
When the Mont Blanc exploded at 9:04am, it devastated a good portion of Halifax including the Richmond district. It caused a cataclysm that was the biggest man-made explosion before the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima almost thirty years later. The Halifax explosion released the equivalent of roughly 3 kilotons of TNT whereas Hiroshima release about 15 kilotons. When the explosion occurred, it killed about 1,600 people instantly that were standing on the docks. Many more people were killed or injured when the explosion threw debris, started fires, and collapsed buildings. An estimated 9,000 more were injured. Hundreds of people witnessed the Mont Blanc on fire looking out of their windows from home or work. Because of the shock of the explosion, many were permanently blinded due to particles of glass flying into their eyes from windows that were shattered because of the blast.
The devastation at Halifax looking toward Dartmouth across the narrows.
(Wikipedia Commons)
One of the many buildings that the explosion destroyed.
(Wikipedia Commons)
The death toll could have been worse. An Intercolonial Railway dispatcher, Patrick Coleman, was operating at the rail yard about 750 ft from Pier 6. Coleman and a co-worker learned of the dangerous cargo aboard the Mont Blanc from a sailor and began to flee. Coleman remembered that an incoming passenger train from Saint John, New Brunswick, was due to arrive at the rail yard within minutes. He returned to the rail yard alone and continued to send out urgent telegraph messages to stop the train. Coleman messaged "Hold up the train. Ammunition ship afire in harbor making for Pier 6 and will explode. Guess this will be my last message. Good-bye boys." Coleman's message was responsible for bringing all incoming trains around Halifax to a halt, saving many lives, but killing Coleman in the process.
The Mont Blanc was completely obliterated, outside of a few small pieces of metal that ended up falling throughout parts of the city. It threw debris for miles. The anchor of the ship, weighing two tons, was thrown two miles away to the south in an area called Armdale. It was believed that the explosion was so massive that it displaced water in the narrows to the point that it exposed the base of the narrows for a couple of seconds. The blast was felt as far away as Cape Breton, 129 miles away, and Prince Edward Island, 110 miles away.
It was believed at first that the explosion was the result of a German attack, but it was soon realized that the explosion was an accident. Relief efforts began to arrive from different parts of Canada and the Northeastern United States. Unfortunately, a blizzard hit Halifax a day after the explosion, hampering efforts to find survivors under the rubble of collapsed buildings. It is believed that many of these survivors froze to death waiting to be rescued.
(Wikipedia Commons)
Small communities of the Mi'kmaq Indigenous people existed around the area of Bedford Basin on the Dartmouth shore. One community sat directly opposite to Pier 9 across the narrows in the Dartmouth area called Turtle Grove. In the years before the explosion, the Department of Indian Affairs had been actively trying to force the Mi'kmaq people to give up their land and move to a reservation, but this had not occurred by the time of the explosion. The Turtle Grove settlement was not rebuilt in the wake of the disaster. Survivors were housed in a racially segregated building under generally poor conditions, and most were eventually dispersed around Nova Scotia.
The black community of Africville, which existed on the southern shores of Bedford Basin near the town of Halifax, was affected. The small and frail homes of this community were heavily damaged by the explosion. Families recorded the deaths of five residents. For years before the explosion, persistent racism existed with the local government wanting to demolish the community to make way for industrial development. As a result, the people of Africville received no police or fire protection. Africville received little of the donated relief funds and none of the progressive reconstruction that was invested in other parts of the area after the explosion.
As a result of the Halifax Explosion, harbor traffic control was looked at closer and became a stricter rule to follow for harbor masters. Also, cargo manifests were more closely watched. The Halifax community still remembers the explosion to the present day. Each December 6th, the people of Halifax holds a service at the memorial bell tower at Fort Needham Park to remember this tragic incident.
Thanks for learning!
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