The BEST episodes of Modern Marvels season 10
Every episode of Modern Marvels season 10, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Modern Marvels season 10!
Celebrating ingenuity, invention and imagination brought to life on a grand scale, MODERN MARVELS tells the fascinating stories of the doers, dreamers and sometime-schemers who created everyday items, technological breakthroughs and man-made wonders.
#1 - Terror Tech: Defending the Highrise
Season 10 - Episode 46 - Aired 8/12/2003
New technology counters the threat of terrorism.
#2 - Lake Pontchartrain Causeway
Season 10 - Episode 60 - Aired 10/15/2003
In the land of Mardi Gras, jambalaya, and zydeco, exits an engineering marvel called the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway that seems to go on forever. Two ribbons of concrete span the largest inland body of water in Louisiana, and at nearly 23.87 and 23.88 miles long, these two spans form the world's longest automobile bridge. At midpoint--12 miles out--water surrounds travelers who are unable to see either shoreline. The bridge is so long, it actually transverses 1/1000th of the earth's circumference!
Watch Now:Amazon
#3 - MiG 15
Season 10 - Episode 22 - Aired 5/10/2003
The MiG 15 was one of the 20th century's most feared high-performance weapons. When it first appeared in 1950, its high speed, lightning maneuverability, and intense firepower outclassed everything in the sky. During the Korean War, when Soviet MiGs engaged with America's F 86 Sabre jets, they finally met their match and a new era in air warfare had begun. Features exclusive interviews with MiG fighter pilots who flew against US pilots and the nephew of the founder of the MiG Design Bureau.
Watch Now:Amazon
#4 - Shipyards
Season 10 - Episode 69 - Aired 11/5/2003
Shipyards are waterside construction sites where some of the largest tools ever built help create the biggest machines on earth.
#5 - Toys
Season 10 - Episode 84 - Aired 12/23/2003
All aboard the nostalgia express as we take a trip through the past to enjoy toys of our youth--the ones we can't forget and those that some of use never gave up! This is the real toy story! We take a look at five categories of boys' toys and see what relationship they have had on the development of young minds; talk with collectors of antique and specialty toys; and visit companies that make electric trains, Matchbox Cars, GI Joe action figures, and LEGO Bricks, among others.
#6 - Early machine guns
Season 10 - Episode 58 - Aired 10/1/2007
Evolution of rapid-fire guns. Included: use of machine guns in the American Civil War.
#7 - Castles & Dungeons
Season 10 - Episode 2 - Aired 1/7/2003
Some of the most imposing structures ever built, medieval castles withstood both bloody assaults and the test of time. Designed like machines with nearly every architectural detail devoted to defense, castles represented the perfect fusion of form and function. Journey back to that unruly era as we examine the complexity of their construction and the multipurposes they served--homes to kings and nobles, economic centers, courthouses, treasuries, prisons, and torture chambers.
#8 - The Exterminator
Season 10 - Episode 28 - Aired 6/3/2003
They have been here for longer than us, and there are many, many more of them. They buzz, skitter and fly, chew, gnaw and occasionally draw blood. Lumped under the broad category of pests and vermin, they are one of the constant enemies in man's battle to maintain dominion over house and home. And the strongest weapon we have is THE EXTERMINATOR.
#9 - Overseas Highway
Season 10 - Episode 53 - Aired 9/3/2003
A spectacular roadway nearly 120 miles long, the Overseas Highway links mainland Florida with the Florida Keys, and contains 51 bridges, including the Seven-Mile Bridge. A boat was the only mode of travel from Miami to Key West until oil tycoon Henry Flagler completed his railroad line in 1912. After a 1935 hurricane destroyed 40 miles of track, the scenic highway was built using Flagler's bridges. A $175-million refurbishment that ended in 1982 resulted in today's remarkable Overseas Highway.
#10 - The Gunboats of Vietnam
Season 10 - Episode 49 - Aired 8/18/2003
Armored gunboats prowl rivers of Vietnam and Southeast Asia.
#11 - Trans-Siberian Railroad
Season 10 - Episode 1 - Aired 1/1/2003
It's the longest, most expensive and complicated railroad ever built. Ordered by the Tsar in an effort to save his empire and unify his country at the twilight of the 19th century, the Trans-Siberian Railroad nearly tore Russia apart. Intended in part for defense, the railroad provoked a war, crossed great lengths over treacherous terrain, and encountered logistical and economic failures. Ironically, "enemies of the state" built the railroad--men sentenced to hard labor in Siberian prisons.
#12 - Loading Docks
Season 10 - Episode 41 - Aired 7/30/2003
Loading docks serve as the connecting point between products coming from the factory to reaching store shelves.
#13 - Metal
Season 10 - Episode 50 - Aired 8/19/2003
They constitute the very essence of the modern world; the cadence of our progress sounds in the measured ring of the blacksmith's hammer. From soaring skyscrapers and sturdy bridges to jet planes and rockets, metals play a key role. Our journey begins before the Bronze Age and takes us into the shiny future when new metal structures--engineered at a molecular level to be stronger, lighter, and cheaper--shape human progress, as they have since man first thrust copper into a fire and forged a tool.
#14 - High Voltage
Season 10 - Episode 30 - Aired 6/24/2003
Look closely at those tall metal towers that span the country and you might see tiny specks climbing up the soaring steel like spiders on an enormous web. Meet the courageous linemen who erect, string, and repair 250-foot high electrical transmission towers, working with energized power lines that can carry up to 765,000 volts!
#15 - Terror Tech: Civilian
Season 10 - Episode 54 - Aired 9/8/2003
Inventors create cutting-edge technology to keep civilians safe.
#16 - FBI Crime Lab
Season 10 - Episode 66 - Aired 10/29/2003
Modern Marvels explores the expensive, high-tech facilities the FBI uses at Quantico.
#17 - Secrets of the Acropolis
Season 10 - Episode 17 - Aired 4/10/2003
With the aid of 3-D animation, Modern Marvels explores the history and the construction of the Acropolis.
#18 - Engineering Disasters (5)
Season 10 - Episode 85 - Aired 12/30/2003
Examines some of the most notorious engineering failures of recent years and asks what went wrong and what we learned from them. We take viewers to the southern coast of Louisiana, where a misplaced oilrig caused an entire lake to be sucked into an underground salt mine; review the 1972 Buffalo Creek dam disaster; revisit the Exxon Valdez oil spill; see how radio and TV antenna towers collapse with alarming regularity; and look at the collision of two California icons--freeways and earthquakes!
#19 - Extreme Trucks
Season 10 - Episode 71 - Aired 11/12/2003
Hop into the cab for the ride of your life as we examine extreme trucks, including: a jet truck that can travel 300 mph; the Baltimore Technical Assistance Response Unit's mobile command truck; a garbage truck with an articulated arm; a concrete pumper truck with telescoping boom and pumping mechanism; and a 4-wheel-drive truck that can convert from mower to street sweeper to backhoe to snow blower in mere minutes. Learn how SWAT, bomb squad, HAZMAT, and crime scene specialty trucks are built.
#20 - Inviting Disaster: High Rise
Season 10 - Episode 68 - Aired 11/4/2003
Based on the popular book, this episode explores historical building collapses--from ancient pyramids to the Cathedral at Beauvais to Kansas City's Hyatt Regency--and demonstrates that clear warning signs often existed, but were ignored. We also examine the collapse of the Twin Towers in New York. Author Jim Chiles believes that designers and engineers must better prepare for all potential disasters--by understanding existing risks, they can prepare for the unknown, like terrorism.
#21 - Military Movers
Season 10 - Episode 44 - Aired 8/6/2003
Military planners move millions of soldiers and tons of cargo halfway around the world and into the thick of action.
#22 - Gunslingers
Season 10 - Episode 32 - Aired 6/26/2003
During America's western expansion, a new breed of man arose--the gunslinger. Sometimes he wore a badge, sometimes he was an outlaw. But he always had a gun at his side, and the urge to step to the edge and pull the trigger. Wild Bill Hickok, Jesse James, Wyatt Earp--see how, the weapons these men carried, etched the gunmen's existence into American history.
#23 - Black Hawk: Night Stalker
Season 10 - Episode 13 - Aired 3/26/2003
The Black Hawk remains the world's most advanced twin-turbine military helicopter.
#24 - Smart Bombs
Season 10 - Episode 59 - Aired 9/30/2003
Precision-guided munitions, smart bombs were the media buzz of the first Gulf War and a major military and political driving force of the second. But their apparent sudden celebrity is deceptive. The history of smart bombs goes back to World War I and includes an ingenious, if eccentric, group of inventions and a cast of characters that boasts a Kennedy and a president of General Motors. Join us for the underground history of smart bombs, and a glimpse into the future of precision weapons.
#25 - Ice Road Truckers
Season 10 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/30/2003
During the harsh winter of Canada's Northwest Territory, remote villages and work camps are cut off from the world. To keep them supplied, a tenacious group of long-haul truckers drive their rigs over hundreds of miles on ice roads cut across the surface of frozen lakes. Sometimes the ice cannot support the heavy rig, and driver and cargo plunge through the ice and sink to the bottom. Hitch a risky ride along with the Ice Road Truckers as they drive headlong into bone-chilling danger.