Hello!
Welcome back to most amazing top 10.
I am Rebecca Felgate and I love History…
it was probably my favourite topic in school…it’s just so interesting to use the power of hindsight
to see how and why we have got where you are.
The great thing about history is also being able to see which were the good decisions
and which were the bad.
Join me as we talk about the top 10 worst mistakes in history…..
California Hunter Fire Wildfires are scary things, and in the hot
dry conditions of summer and early autumn, they can happen and in some places special
measures should be taken to prevent them.
Sadly in San Diego in 2003, a hunter had got lost so decided to light a signal fire near
San Diego County Estates.
This was a huge mistake that sparked the worst wild fire the state of California has ever
seen.
The fire raged for ** days and at its height was travelling at 15 kilometres an hour.
The flames destroyed nearing 300 thousand acres and thousands of buildings.
Sadly 14 civilians and 1 firefighter lost their life.
The fire caused 1.5 billion dollars worth of damage.
Rejecting trade with Mongol Empire The Khwarezmind Empire, now Iran and Iraq,
was destroyed in the 13th century when Empire leader, Ala Ad Din Muhammad refused a deal
with Genghis Khan, ruthless leader of the Mongol Empire.
Khan had sought trade deals with the neighbouring empire, an offer which was refused.
Souring things further, one of the Mongol Diplomats sent in to negotiate was murdered
by the Khwarezmid.
Ultimately this led to Khan deploying over 200,000 men and totally destroying the Khwarezmid
empire.
- Crash of Wall Street The stockmarket crash of 1929 came as a result
of a series of cataclysmic mistakes in American Banking.
Ultimately, more money was out on loan in the United States than the country owned.
The rise in consumerism in America led to over production, overconfidence led to irresponsible
loans and a lot of people were buying shares on borrowed money, especially small banks
that couldn’t sustain it.
In the end, the American economy was a house of cards that collapsed, taking most industrialized
western nations with it, including Germany, who were struggling to pay their war debts.
This crash of the stock market put 13 millions Americans out of work, led to a ten year depression
during which millions starved and created an overseas economic climate that contributed
to world war 2.
More astute and modest production and lending would have avoided this.
Inflation considered, around 319 billion dollars was lost in the states alone during the crash
of 29.
Vanity aboard the Titanic There are a number of reasons the Titanic
sank, and a number of reasons why so many lost their life, and most of those reasons
stem back to poor decision making influenced by vanity.
Firstly, there were not enough lifeboats aboard to save everyone because those in charge thought
that the deck looked too cluttered…..which was a gross failure of health and safety.
While there were repots of icebergs on the Titanic’s planned route, these weren’t
taken too seriously.
While captains would have been better advised to sail carefully, White Starlines Chairman
Bruce Ismay wanted to make headlines and get to New York early, so demanded the Titanic
sail quicker.
As a result, the Titanic was sailing at 22 knots when she hit the berg, had her speed
been less, she may have better been maneuvered when it came into sight.
Design and staff incompetence led to one of the biggest peace time maritime diseasters.
Who still uses the Imperial system…..
America….anyone else….urm…
no…not really…well…Myanmar and Liberia.
… so bear that in mind as we discuss the Mars Climate Orbiter catastrophy.
So a team of team of engineers working together to create the Mars Climate Oribiter mission
made an embarrassing gaffe as some used the metric system for their calculations and others
used the imperial system….
Ultimately the orbiter was not made well and the mission was a failure to the tine if 125
million dollars.
Sure, the mission failed and cost a lot of money, but we also missed out on valuable
Mars research that could have helped us learn even more about our red neighbour at a quicker
rate than we were since able to discover.
Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.
BP were found responsible for gross negligence and reckless misconduct, and were ordered
to pay 18 .7 billion dollars in fines, the largest amount in corporate American history.
Because of BP’s negligence, the well plan at the huge off shore oil rig was insufficient,
as was the blowout preventer equipment.
In April 2010 the a methane explosion caused an oil spill, the ultimately dumped around
5 million gallons of oil into the gulf of Mexico.
11 oil workers were lost in the spill and never found at 17 more were injured.
Hundreds of thousands of wildlife species suffered as a result of the oil slick, that
could be seen from space.
Dolphins, for example, died at 6 times faster than their normal rate.
It took 5 months to stop the rig from leaking.
4 - Chernobyl Disaster The Chernobyl power plant disaster was caused
by a badly designed reactor as well as human error.
On that fateful day in 1986, power plant workers decided to run reactors at very low power,
which they were not designed for.
As a result, part of the plant blew up and there was not a very good containment system
in place.
A nuclear fire burned for 7 days, poisoning the surrounding area.
28 staff members were killed in the explosion and thousands of people in the surrounding
area were exposed to harmful radiation.
It is thought that Cherynobyl has led to 7,000 cases of thyroid cancer among people who were
under 18 years of age at the time of the accident.
3 - Iraq War President George Bush went to war with Iraq
on the basis that the country had a supply of Weapons of Mass Destruction and in retaliation
to the 9/11 attacks, which he pinned partially on Saddam Hussien.
The problem was that these weapons were never found, the war on terror only created more
terror cells and the toppling of Saddam’s regime created more problems than it solved.
Between 150 to 600,000 lost their lives as a result of the conflict, as did 4 thousand
400 American soldiers.
It is thought the war in Iraq cost the American Economy between 2 to 6 TRILLION DOLLARS……
As with everything on this list, a lot of mistakes are complicated….so of course a
paragraph in a top 10 list isn’t going to be able to fully cover the bases of the Iraq
war….it is definitely worth doing your own independent research on too.
Next up, we have the totally avoidable events that led to the biggest oil spill in history.
…coming in to number 2 we have 2 - Declining Hitler a place at Art School
Before Hitler became a dictator, he had wanted to become an artist.
He applied to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna but was declined a place on two occasions.
Perhaps if he had been able to focus his energy in art and had a creative outlet for his suffering,
he may never have become radicalized and risen to be the all powerful instigator of world
war two, which saw the loss of 75 or more million lives.
Of course without the first world war, there wouldn’t have been a second finally, at
number one….one of the biggest mistakes in history sparked the first world war….
1 - Franz Ferdinand’s Driver Took a Wrong Turn.
Many agree that the assassination of Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand of Austria was the spark
that ignited world War 1, and it very almost nearly didn’t happen.
Franz Ferdinand was in Sarajevo when the Black Hand Gang attempted to kill him by throwing
a grenade at their car.
Ferdinand and his wife were unharmed, but were later killed when their driver did a
uturn near a café in which a defeated member of the gang was having a coffee….seizing
his second chance, he shot Ferdinand and his wife….which later resulted in Austria declaring
war on Serbia…..which then led to other nations declaring war
and the beginning of the first ever world war.
We’re in the middle of making terrible decisions right
now.
If the Affordable Care Act is revoked, it would be a huge travesty.