Explosion

Holy crap! Yesterday morning, after turning on the computer, and the first news article that caught my attention was about the steam pipe explosion in Manhattan several hours earlier, killing one person.

Apparently a steam pipe exploded when a burst of cold water got into the pipe, tore a huge crater into the street, and sent a geyser of steam and mud shooting into the air and raining debris on people on the streets. According to an article, "the initial burst of steam rose higher than the nearby 77-story Chrysler Building, one of Manhattan's tallest buildings." At one point in history, the Chrysler Building was the tallest building in the world, so you can imagine how high that shot up!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070719/ap_on_re_us/manhattan_explosion

Also what caught my attention was the location of this explosion. It happened a mere 7 blocks from where we used to live in New York, and 13 short blocks from where I used to work. So if we hadn't moved to Hong Kong and were still be living in NYC, it would've been right around our neighborhood... that would've hit pretty close to home, literally.

I can't imagine how messy and chaotic it must've been over there. I'm sure some people fleeing the explosion initially had 9/11 on their minds. So freaky how it happened without warning...