The BEST episodes of Seconds From Disaster
Every episode of Seconds From Disaster ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Seconds From Disaster!
Accounts of famous technological disasters and their subsequent investigations.
#2 - Killer Quake (Kobe Earthquake)
Season 2 - Episode 6 - Aired 8/30/2005
On 17 January 1995, the Japanese city of Kobe was rocked by the Great Hanshin Earthquake, which destroyed buildings and killed over 1000 people and left thousands homeless. Why couldn't the top of the art equipment predict a disaster of this magnitude?
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#4 - Fire on the Ski Slope
Season 1 - Episode 9 - Aired 8/31/2004
November 11, 2000, started out as a normal day at the Kaprun ski resort in Austria, as a Furnicular train climbing the slopes breaks down in a tunnel. Passengers then realise it's on fire. Only 12 make it out alive, leaving 155 people to die horribly. But how could such a modern train break down and catch fire?
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#6 - Disco Bombing (The Bali Bombing)
Season 2 - Episode 8 - Aired 9/20/2005
Bali, located in Indonesia, is one of the most popular resorts in the world. But 202 die on the night of October 12, 2002, Muslim terrorists detonate several bombs in local nightclubs. Its the horror of 9/11 all over again.
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#7 - Flood at Stava Dam
Season 1 - Episode 11 - Aired 10/12/2004
On July 1985, Italy's Stava Dam collapses and demolishes 70 structures killing 268 people in the process. Was there a fault in the design of the dam? Is this something that could happen to any dam around the world? Find out how a structural failure leads to a massive catastrophe with Flood at Stava Dam
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#9 - Wreck of the Sunset Limited
Season 1 - Episode 6 - Aired 8/10/2004
September 1993. The captain of a towboat unwittingly causes the collapse of a bridge over the Big Bayou Canot. When an Amtrak train comes along, it derails with 47 lives lost. Why was such a hideous mistake made? How could it have been prevented? Could it have been prevented at all? Wreck of the Sunset Limited explains why over 40 people died that Autumn day.
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#10 - Meltdown in Chernobyl
Season 1 - Episode 7 - Aired 8/17/2004
We make mistakes every few seconds of our lives. They are unavoidable. But sometimes the results can be disastrous. On April 26, 1986, a series of catastrophic blunders leave dozens dead when the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant melts down.
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#11 - Superstore Collapse
Season 3 - Episode 11 - Aired 9/20/2006
On 29 June 1995, the five story Sampoong Department Store in Seoul, Korea, collapses killing 502 people. Is there a fault in the building? Or is sabotage to blame? And how did the last survivor survive under the rubble for 16 days?
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#14 - Comet Air Crash
Season 3 - Episode 14 - Aired 11/15/2006
The DH Comet is the first jet airliner and the pride of the British Overseas Airways Corporation. But on January 10, 1954, BOAC Flight 781, enroute from Rome to London, explodes catastrophically and crashes, killing 35 people. The investigation begins, but when South African Airways Flight 201 crashes exactly the same way taking another 21 lives, all Comets are grounded and the investigation takes a step forward.
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#18 - Jonestown Cult Suicide
Season 6 - Episode 2 - Aired 11/5/2012
On November 18, 1978, when enigmatic cult leader Reverend Jim Jones calls all his followers together in South America, the resulting tragedy becomes the largest mass murder-suicide of US citizens in history - 909 are dead.
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#19 - Aircraft Carrier Explosion
Season 3 - Episode 8 - Aired 8/15/2006
The massive aircraft carrier USS Forrestal is sailing to Vietnam on July 29, 1967, when a fighter jet explodes, a massive blast rocks the ship, and in just 17 hours 134 men lose their lives. Was it hostile fire, human error, or a fault in the fighter jets.
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#23 - Hotel Collapse
Season 2 - Episode 9 - Aired 9/27/2005
Hotel New World, budget hotel located in Singapore's Little India, collapses on 15 March, 1986. After a 7 day rescue operation, 17 people are rescued but 33 perish. Why did the hotel collapse? Was it sabotage? Or was it faulty maintenance?
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#24 - Chinook Helicopter Crash
Season 6 - Episode 10 - Aired 1/7/2013
On June 2, 1994, a Royal Air Force Boeing Chinook helicopter crashes on the Mull of Kintyre, on the west coast of Scotland. All 29 people aboard die, 25 of them being counter-terrorism officers who battled the IRA. The initial investigation cites pilot error as the cause, but several more investigations take place over the next 17 years before this verdict is overturned.
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#25 - Explosion in the North Sea
Season 1 - Episode 10 - Aired 10/5/2004
July 6, 1988. The Piper Alpha stands over 110 miles off Scotland. But on this fateful day, a gas leak causes a catastrophic fire with a loss of 167 workers. Why did the Piper Alpha explode without warning? Was Human Error to blame? What about Mechanical Failure? Or even sabotage?
Watch Now:Amazon