The London Beer Flood was an accident at Meux's & Co's Horseshoe Brewery that took place on October 17th, 1814. It happened because one of the twenty-two-foot tall vats of fermenting beer broke open and poured through the streets. The resulting pressure caused another vessel to burst and between 128,000 and 323,000 gallons of beer to cascade through the city.
As a result of this disaster, eight people, unfortunately, lost their lives. To make matters worse, the lives lost were the mourners of a wake being held near the area to honor the death of a two-year-old. The coroner ruled the deaths "casually, accidentally and by misfortune." The giant wave caused the brewery to almost go bankrupt, only saved by a rebate given by an insurance company to compensate for the lost beer.
Fun Facts:
- The Meux Brewery was one of the largest in Britain, but the disaster bankrupted the company in the long run, as nobody wanted to buy their beer after the incident.
- The brewery's clerk, George Crick, noticed that one of the iron bands around the vat had slipped, but Crick was unconcerned, as this sort of thing happened two or three times a year. When Crick told his supervisor about the problem, he said "that no harm [whatsoever] would ensue"
- Stories arose that described hundreds of people who collected the beer and became extremely drunk and many died from alcohol poisoning.
Meux Brewery:
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