Disaster Area

At first, people who wandered over from Washington Square Park thought someone was throwing sack of shirtwaists out of the ninth floor windows of the Asch Building. But it quickly became apparent to the watching New Yorkers that these weren't bags of the Triangle Factory's finished products -- they were women. These young women had no other option, caught between the raging inferno blowing through the factory on March 25, 1911, and the ninth-story drop in front of them.

When children die in a disaster, it's the worst of tragedies. When children die due to the diabolical work of a man with dark intentions, it's even worse. May 18, 1927, was a typical spring day in Bath, Michigan, until a pair of explosions broke the day apart. One set the Kehoe farm alight. The other struck the Bath Consolidated School with devastating consequences.

Keren and Assaf Dror thought May 24, 2001 would be the happiest day of their lives, and it was -- up until the floor collapsed at the wedding hall where hundreds of friends and family were dancing together in celebration.

Captain Carlos Dardano and his crew performed an exceptional feat of airmanship when their brand-new 737 lost both engines while landing over New Orleans during a violent thunderstorm.

For fuck's sake, Jolene. Jennifer revisits the "let's watch a nice educational TV movie about what'll happen when the Russians nuke us" genre by watching "The Day After." You know, the cheerful one.

Released in 1976, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" by Gordon Lightfoot told the tragic story of the sudden loss in a November storm of a freighter hauling iron ore pellets to Detroit. The SS Edmund Fitzgerald went down with a loss of 29 crewmen and left an enduring mystery of what may have really happened in its final moments.

On September 13, 1987, two thieves in the city of Goiania in Brazil sneaked into what was left of an abandoned clinic and stole what they thought was simply scrap metal they could sell for a few extra bucks. Instead, their theft led to a radioactive disaster the effects of which still impact the people and city of Goiania to this day.

It's one of the biggest American disasters you may never have heard of. On April 23, 1940, over 200 people died when the Rhythm Club caught fire in Natchez, Mississippi. But one of the most lethal fires America's ever seen has slipped through the cracks of history. (TW: This episode also features discussion of the tragic Pulse shooting in Orlando this past weekend.)

When a plane went down in the Santa Clara Mountains in California in December 1987, only the smallest of clues were left behind for the NTSB and FBI to piece together to find out what (or who) killed 43 people.

This week, Jennifer takes an episode off and stays sober to watch "Twister," because who needs to get drunk when you've got magical tank tops, slightly less creepy than normal clown dolls, and omnipotent cell phones?