16 Facts About Halifax Explosion

1.

Completion of the Intercolonial Railway and its Deep Water Terminal in 1880 allowed for increased steamship trade and led to accelerated development of the port area, but Halifax Explosion faced an economic downturn in the 1890s as local factories struggled to compete with businesses in central Canada.

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2.

Halifax Explosion intended to join a slow convoy gathering in Bedford Basin readying to depart for Europe but was too late to enter the harbour before the nets were raised.

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3.

Halifax Explosion let out another single blast of his whistle, hoping the other vessel would likewise move to starboard but was again met with a double-blast.

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4.

Halifax Explosion returned to his post alone and continued to send out urgent telegraph messages to stop the train.

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5.

Halifax Explosion was isolated by the storm, and while rescue committees were forced to suspend the search for survivors, the storm aided efforts to put out fires throughout the city.

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6.

Dartmouth was not as densely populated as Halifax Explosion and was separated from the blast by the width of the harbour, but still suffered heavy damage.

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7.

Directly opposite to Pier 9 on the Halifax Explosion side sat a community in Tufts Cove which included the Mi'kmaq community of Turtle Grove.

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8.

Black community of Africville, on the southern shores of Bedford Basin adjacent to the Halifax Explosion Peninsula, was spared the direct force of the blast by the shadow effect of the raised ground to the south.

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9.

Many people in Halifax first thought the explosion to be the result of a German attack.

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10.

The Halifax Herald continued to propagate this belief for some time, for example reporting that Germans had mocked victims of the explosion.

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11.

Every building in the Halifax Explosion dockyard required some degree of rebuilding, as did HMCS Niobe and the docks themselves; all of the Royal Canadian Navy's minesweepers and patrol boats were undamaged.

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12.

Halifax Explosion was one of the largest artificial non-nuclear explosions.

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13.

Many eye injuries resulting from the disaster led to better understanding of how to care for damaged eyes, and "with the recently formed Canadian National Institute for the Blind, Halifax Explosion became internationally known as a centre for care for the blind", according to Dalhousie University professor Victoria Allen.

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14.

The Halifax Explosion inspired a series of health reforms, including around public sanitation and maternity care.

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15.

Keith Ross Leckie scripted a miniseries entitled Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion, which took the title but has no relationship to Janet Kitz's non-fiction book Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion and the Road to Recovery.

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16.

In 1918, Halifax Explosion sent a Christmas tree to the City of Boston in thanks and remembrance for the help that the Boston Red Cross and the Massachusetts Public Safety Committee provided immediately after the disaster.

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