The Day's Dumpster Fire

The Great Train Wreck of 1918 - Episode 74

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/fan_mail/new] Ed's by himself today so he's got the entire episode for himself to do as he pleases. Kara is on vacation and that means Ed can do whatever type of episode he wants so what could possibly go wrong? As a result of Kara being vacation, Ed decided to do and episode themed off nothing else done before in The Day's Dumpster Fire [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] history. and episode dedicated to one of the worst train accidents in American history.  What was supposed to be a normal July 9, 1918, early morning train ride for folks coming in from Memphis TN to Nashville and folks coming out of Nashville TN heading to Memphis, two trains collided just a little way outside of Nashville on a blind turn called "Dutchman's Curve." This collision marked the worst train collision in US history and took the lives of over 101 men, women, and children. Furthermore, about 80% of the people who died that day were African Americans who were trying to head to a munitions factory for work.  In this episode, Ed will nerd out on some cool facts about how steam engines work and why they dominated the mass transit system of the 1800s and early 1900s. He will also dig into the litany of safety issues that resulted in the disfigurement of many railroad workers if they didn't end up dying doing their jobs. Next Ed will describe the geography of where the collision took place as well as the two trains involved. He'll explain how the accident took place, who or what was at fault and what Ed thinks is the real culprit behind this terrible accident.  It's not what you think! So, you better sit down and listen. You might just learn some math along the way.  Of course, if you disagree with Ed's theories or want to add your own be sure to email Kara and Ed at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com come.  Check out the website [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/]and send a text if you want. This is not your typical dumpster fire, and it invites the community to chip in their theories.  If you're interested in this episode, check out these! The Transatlantic Telegraph [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/the-transatlantic-telegraph-episode-37] The Hindenburg  [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/the-hindenburg-episode-57] Hey before you go!  If have ideas for future episodes that you want Kara and Ed to look into, email them at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com. They would love to hear from you! You can also send them a text message by clicking on the link at the top.  Be sure to head on over to www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for the ever growing library of historical dumpster fires.  Check us out on the ol Instagrams! https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/ [https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/]

The Bat Bomb of WWII Fire Part 2. - Episode 73

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/fan_mail/new] We here at the Day's Dumpster Fire  [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] felt that The Bat Bomb of WWII Fire Part 1 [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/episodes/19078729] episode was so iconic and a breath of fresh air given the stresses of modern day living, Ed and Kara hammered through the recording and editing of Part 2 early so that you wouldn't have to wait tow weeks for the conclusion. Even though it would be worth the wait, Part 2 of The Bat Bomb of WWII should be released sooner than later! In this episode, Ed and Kara discuss the establishing, engineering, testing, and subsequent conclusions of Dr. Lytle Adams' brain child, the bat bomb or better known in the top secret circles: Project X-Ray.  If the Manhattan Project consisted of elite top tier scientists and engineers headed up by one of the greatest minds of 20th century, Project X-ray was the exact opposite. Comprised of a team of only two scientists, a hotel manager, a body builder, a pilot turned movie star, two random brothers with nothing else to do in the 1940s, a lobster fisherman, and two high school students, the idea of a bat bomb burning down cities in Japan would have been better reflected in a television comedy series.  Ed will show how Project X-Ray was put together, how the bats were selected, how little napalm bombs were attached to them, how they were stuffed into a glorified toilet paper tube after being flash frozen and then dropped out of a B-25 bomber outside Los Angeles and the conclusion that were derived from such a test.  Furthermore, Ed will look at how those conclusions were put together to make a second bomb but with actual destructive capabilities! World War II was a scary, intense, and involved time in American history, but it was also a time where any idea could be entertained. Some ideas were hugely successful and changed the trajectory of human history, and others... well... simply went up in smoke. Not to spoil anything, but we'll let you decided where Dr. Adams' bat bomb sat in terms of historical influence.  Hey before you go!  If have ideas for future episodes that you want Kara and Ed to look into, email them at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com. They would love to hear from you! You can also send them a text message by clicking on the link at the top.  Be sure to head on over to www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for the ever growing library of historical dumpster fires.  Check us out on the ol Instagrams! https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/ [https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/]

The Bat Bomb of WWII Fire Part 1. - Episode 72

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/fan_mail/new] In today's episode, Ed decided to go down a different kind of dumpster fire. Instead of a large volume of people being killed or injured or thousands of people losing their retirements due to sketchy accounting practices. The Bat Bomb of WWII is a testament to the creativity of the human mind in times of extreme need and how not all ideas are going to be good.  While vacationing in Carlsbad, New Mexico to watch bats, dentist / eccentric inventor, Dr. Lytle S. Adams, heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 that sent America into World War II. The first half of 1942 didn't go well for America when fighting the Japanese Empire for a multitude of reasons, but Dr. Adams thought of using bats to wreak havoc on the Japanese Empire's homeland of...  well... Japan...  In this episode, you're going to be regaled with founding, setup, testing, and conclusions from one of the most "bat brained" ideas of WWII. Dr. Adams selected an elite crew of scientists and contributors to put together a bomb that when dropped, would dispense over 1,000 bats all carrying a little incendiary capsule of napalm. The idea was that the bats would disperse over Japan, find dark attics and other nooks and crannies so that the napalm charge would go off and set fire to the building.  The plan was so well thought out and so perfect, that if implemented correctly, it could rival that of another type of weapon being researched in Los Alamos at the same exact time as the Bat Bomb just out side Los Angeles... the nuclear bomb! This is all assuming that Adams and his team could make this Bat Bomb idea actually work and not burn the entire program to the ground in the process.  Oh wait! This is going to be two parter episode, but you won't have to wait two weeks for Ed to get the episode out containing the thrilling conclusion. If all goes according to plan, part 2 will be out a few days after this episode airs... What could possibly go wrong? Some other episodes that you might find interesting based on the time period and / or mentioned in the Bat Bomb episode: Oppie's Demo Core Fire [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episodes-17-oppies-demon-core-fire] The Dust Bowl [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/the-dustbowl-episode-48] Prohibition (Episodes 59-62) [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/prohibition-episodes-59-62] The Great Depression (Episodes 65-68) [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/the-great-depression-episodes-65] Be sure to check out the Day's Dumpster Fire [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] website for detailed show notes, images, Kara's drawings, as well as an ever growing library of humanity's most fantastic failures! Hey before you go!  If have ideas for future episodes that you want Kara and Ed to look into, email them at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com. They would love to hear from you! You can also send them a text message by clicking on the link at the top.  Be sure to head on over to www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for the ever growing library of historical dumpster fires.  Check us out on the ol Instagrams! https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/ [https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/]

Enron's Financial Fiasco Fire - Episode 71

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/fan_mail/new] In today's episode, Ed takes us down memory lane to one of the biggest business fraud cases of the 20th century.  Enron was a company that was the product of two major gas businesses that merged together with a vision to change how the world viewed work culture and how to make money with wild result.  For much of much of the 90s, Enron was the future of corporate mentality and high morale among employees with tons of opportunity and even more prospects of striking it rich in the world of negotiating deals between natural gas sellers and buyers. As the years went by, Enron continuously dropped earnings reports that showed nothing but success, year over year growth, and a cash flow that would never end. As a result, Enron got rich, its executives got rich, investors got even richer, banks were happy to lend Enron money, and its employees were excited in what they sold.  There was one catch though...  ...No one knew exactly how Enron was making any money! And that was done by design.  As you'll see in this episode, Enron's CEO Ken Lay, and his two conspirators Jeff Skilling and Andrew Fastow, quickly turned an honest company of limited (but honest and stable) growth to a company on a meteoric trajectory unlike anything else in American history. However, it was done by bending the rules, flagrant fraud, hiding figures, and implicating CPA firms in piles of shredded documents.  All of us have made some financial blunders in our time, but few in humanity have successfully railroaded a billion dollar publicly traded company into the ground quick like Lay, Skilling, and Fastow did. In a few short months in 2001, These three men went from millionaires to Federally convicted felons. We may be stressing over a missed credit car payment, but at least we didn't cost the life savings, retirements, and careers of over 100,000 men and women who were oblivious to all the craziness that was taking place on the 50th floor of Enron's corporate headquarters in Houston, Texas.  For pictures and show notes, check out The Day's Dumpster Fire [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/home] website Some other episodes Kara and Ed have put together that follows a similar "corporate greed and fraud" theme where business leaders prioritized money over literally EVERYTHING ELSE: Therac-25  [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episode-9-therac-25-fire] Boston Molasses Flood [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episode-14-boston-molasses-flood-fire] I Love the Smell of Lead [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episodes-23-24-i-love-the-smell-of-lead-fire] Thalidomide [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/thalidomide-episode-44] Outro Music Credit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdNYSTbPuL0&list=PLfP6i5T0-DkKlAN_qDvZ3nJwsdKRmrxI_&index= [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdNYSTbPuL0&list=PLfP6i5T0-DkKlAN_qDvZ3nJwsdKRmrxI_&index=2] Hey before you go!  If have ideas for future episodes that you want Kara and Ed to look into, email them at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com. They would love to hear from you! You can also send them a text message by clicking on the link at the top.  Be sure to head on over to www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for the ever growing library of historical dumpster fires.  Check us out on the ol Instagrams! https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/ [https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/]

The Flixborough Chemical Fire - Episode 70

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2071919/fan_mail/new] Ed is back for another "recent" historical dumpster fire in which a chemical that manufactures a chemical necessary for nylon production explodes in the largest non-WWII explosion in British history. They Nypro Flixborough chemical facility was built in the late 60's to be a sleek, state of the art facility that turned an extremely flammable substance called cyclohexane and turn it into caprolactam. Caprolactam is one of the key ingredients to making nylon which is a ubiquitous substance found everywhere in the modern era. Without nylon, everything from clothing to car parts to kitchen utensils and even surgical implants would be impossible.  On paper and in the minds of the workers and their families, the Flixborough facility was the wave of the future and offered a means of a modern livelihood... until one of the massive reaction tanks that turns 20 tons of cyclohexane into caprolactam develops a crack and could potentially result in an explosion that could destroy the entire complex.  In this case, the dumpster fire isn't the crack, or what managers refused to do that often results in dumpster fires, but it's what the managers DID do that caused so many problems... or one big one! Take a listen and hop on over to the Day's Dumpster Fire website [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for show notes, sources, and pictures of what happened to this facility and how it affected an entire community in the English countryside.  Some other episodes that were mentioned in this episode that you might find interesting are: Nuclear Power Plants [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episode-4-nuclear-power-plant-fire] Victorian Bread Making [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episode-6-victorian-bread-fire] The Boston Molasses Flood [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/episode-14-boston-molasses-flood-fire] Byford Dolphin Incident [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/byford-dolphin-incident-episode-46] The Deepwater Horizon Incident [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/episodes/deep-water-horizon-episodes-63-64] All of the above episodes have something common with the Flixborough Chemical Fire. Send Ed and Kara an email at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com when you notice the connection or what they all have in common? In other words, what often gets in the way of safety, sound practices, engineered solutions, and quotas in manufacturing that turns into a dumpster fire or contents for this podcast? Hey before you go!  If have ideas for future episodes that you want Kara and Ed to look into, email them at thedaysdumpsterfire@gmail.com. They would love to hear from you! You can also send them a text message by clicking on the link at the top.  Be sure to head on over to www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com [https://www.thedaysdumpsterfire.com/] for the ever growing library of historical dumpster fires.  Check us out on the ol Instagrams! https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/ [https://www.instagram.com/thedaysdumpsterfire/]