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The Brooklyn Bridge Should Have Been Impossible in 1870 — Transcript

by Engineering The Impossible · 2,220 words · 401 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:03This is the Brooklyn Bridge. You've seen
0:06it a thousand times. Postcards, movies,
0:08Instagram. But the part [music] that
0:10should impress you is down there, buried
0:13under the river.
0:14How do you build a bridge across a
0:16waterway when there's no solid ground
0:18beneath it?
0:19In 1870, the answer almost killed
0:22everyone who tried.
0:24New York and Brooklyn were two separate
0:26cities at the time.
0:27More than 130,000 people crossed the
0:30East River every single day on ferries,
0:33>> [music]
0:33>> and the ferries were a disaster.
0:35Fog shut them down, ice shut them down.
0:38In winter, you could be stuck on the
0:40wrong side of the river for weeks.
0:43So why not just build a bridge?
0:45Two problems.
0:47First, the East River is almost 1,600 ft
0:50wide. That's longer than four football
0:52fields.
0:53Second, it's one of the busiest shipping
0:55lanes on Earth. You can't just fill it
0:58with bridge supports and turn the water
0:59into a maze.
1:01Only one design could pull this off, a
1:03suspension bridge. Two towers, cables
1:06stretched between them, channel stays
1:08open.
1:09But we have a small problem.
1:12In 1870, suspension bridges had a real
1:15habit of falling down. And the man who
1:17said he could build one anyway, was
1:19about to become the bridge's first
1:21victim. His name's John Roebling. A
1:25German immigrant and engineer, 63 years
1:28old and already a legend. He had
1:30completed six suspension structures in
1:32America, but this one,
1:34this was going to be his masterpiece.
1:37A bridge across the East River, 50%
1:40longer than anything ever attempted on
1:42Earth.
1:43He wanted to build it out of something
1:44nobody had ever used for a major bridge,
1:47steel.
1:49Every suspension bridge before this used
1:51iron cables. Iron was proven. Iron was
1:54safe. Iron was also, for a span this
1:57long, going to snap. Roebling did the
2:00math. Steel had twice [music] the
2:02tensile strength. It would hold.
2:05In June, 1869, the federal government
2:08formally approved the plan, clearing the
2:10way for construction.
2:12Three weeks later, John Roebling was
2:14standing on a ferry slip on the Brooklyn
2:16waterfront, surveying the spot where his
2:19bridge would rise.
2:20A ferry came into dock and crushed his
2:23foot against the pilings. He refused the
2:25doctors, treated it himself with water.
2:28The wound got infected. 24 days later,
2:32tetanus killed him. He never saw a
2:34single stone laid.
2:36The bridge had taken its first life
2:38before construction even started.
2:41It would not be the last.
2:43In August, 1869, a 32-year-old
2:46Washington Roebling, Civil War veteran
2:49and the dead man's son, took over.
2:51Now, he's running the biggest
2:53construction project in American
2:54history. And almost immediately, he hits
2:57a problem his father had underestimated.
3:00The East River was tidal, salty, and
3:03treacherous.
3:04And beneath its surface, not rock, just
3:07layers of silt, clay, and glacial
3:10deposits.
3:11To anchor the towers, Washington had to
3:13dig through all of it down to a firm
3:15foundation.
3:17On the Brooklyn side, that meant going
3:19down 44 ft, all the way to bedrock.
3:23On the Manhattan side, 78 ft, and they
3:26still hadn't hit rock. That's deeper
3:29than a seven-story building, except
3:32you're going down.
3:34So, how do you dig an underwater hole
3:36that deep with 1870s [music] tech? No
3:39scuba gear, no submarines, and no modern
3:42pumps.
3:44Washington turned to a technology that
3:46had only been tried a handful of times,
3:48the pneumatic caisson.
3:50You build a box around the hole and you
3:52send men inside it.
3:54Here's how it worked.
3:56Picture a cereal bowl. Flip it upside
3:58down.
4:00Push it into a sink full of water.
4:02Notice how a pocket of air stays trapped
4:04inside?
4:05Now, imagine that bowl as the size of
4:08half a football field.
4:10Built out of timber beams 15 to 22 ft
4:13thick, open on the bottom, sealed on the
4:15top, and pumped full of compressed air
4:18to keep the river out. That's a caisson.
4:23This is either madness or brilliance.
4:26The men climbed down through an iron
4:28tube sealed in an airlock.
4:30Then waited while the pressure cranked
4:32up to match the chamber below.
4:34Only then could they open the bottom
4:35hatch and drop into the box. What they
4:38found down there sounds like a
4:39nightmare.
4:41The air pressure was 35 lb per square
4:43[music] inch, the same pressure a scuba
4:45diver feels at 78 ft underwater. Except
4:49scuba divers don't stay there for 8-hour
4:51shifts.
4:52The lighting? Calcium lamps that hissed
4:55and flickered, also known as limelights.
4:58The temperature? About 80° and humid.
5:02Workers stripped to the waist, sweating
5:04in the dim light while icy water lapped
5:06at their feet.
5:08They shoveled out muck, hauled rocks,
5:10blasted boulders with dynamite. Yes,
5:13dynamite, inside a pressurized wooden
5:16chamber.
5:17The pay for this? $2 a day.
5:20A modest premium over common labor, but
5:23not nearly enough to match the risk,
5:25about 50 bucks in today's money.
5:28And that's when the real nightmare
5:29began, inside their own blood.
5:32Here's what happened.
5:34As pressure dropped, nitrogen in the
5:36blood didn't stay liquid. It turned to
5:38gas, forming bubbles that tore through
5:41muscle, blocked blood flow, and lodged
5:44in the spinal cord.
5:46When men resurfaced, they would double
5:48over, unable to straighten their spines.
5:51Despite the pay, the turnover rate was
5:54so high that most men only lasted one
5:56shift before vowing never to come back.
6:00Doctors were helpless. They theorized
6:02the air was too rich. They prescribed
6:05ginger ale, cold showers, and leeches.
6:09None of it worked.
6:11While official records cite only 20 to
6:1230 deaths from the caisson disease, the
6:15true number is likely closer to 100.
6:18And then in 1872, the caisson claimed
6:22its most famous victim.
6:24Washington Roebling worked alongside his
6:26men, once staying underground for nearly
6:2824 hours to fight a fire.
6:32In the spring of 1872,
6:34after a rapid ascent from the Manhattan
6:36side, his body broke.
6:39He was carried home and never returned
6:40to the construction site.
6:42At 35, he was half blind, voiceless, and
6:46in constant [music] pain.
6:48For the next 11 years, he watched his
6:50bridge being built through the
6:51telescope, sitting at a window in
6:54Brooklyn.
6:55The brain of the project, trapped in a
6:57body that could no longer reach it.
7:00Then, his wife stepped in.
7:02Her name was Emily Warren Roebling.
7:05She had no engineering training, none.
7:08She was a 28-year-old woman in 1872,
7:11in a country where women couldn't even
7:13vote.
7:14But she became Washington's eyes, his
7:17hands, his voice.
7:19She relayed his instructions to the site
7:22[music] and defended his designs to the
7:24board.
7:25And here's the part that gets me.
7:27For over a century, the official story
7:29was that Washington Roebling built the
7:31Brooklyn Bridge. His name was on the
7:34plaques and in the textbooks. Emily got
7:37a footnote.
7:38Today, there's a small inscription on
7:40the bridge that finally acknowledges
7:42her. Her first test, getting the towers
7:45out of the river.
7:47After the caisson settled,
7:48>> [music]
7:49>> the real vertical climb began.
7:51The towers had to rise over 270 ft above
7:54the water,
7:55taller than [music] any building in New
7:57York City except the spire of Trinity
7:59Church.
8:00For 4 years, workers hoisted massive
8:03granite and limestone blocks using a
8:05pulley system powered by steam engines
8:07at ground level.
8:09By mid-1873,
8:11the Brooklyn tower had reached 164 ft.
8:15The Manhattan tower lagged behind at 88
8:17ft.
8:18The Brooklyn's towers' arches were
8:20completed by August 1874,
8:23>> [music]
8:23>> and its saddle plates, the crucial
8:25fittings that would hold the entire
8:26bridge, were installed that December.
8:29The Manhattan tower wouldn't catch up
8:31until July 1876.
8:34The work was brutal.
8:36Meanwhile, the project had burned
8:38through its original $5 million budget.
8:41The city had to beg the legislature for
8:43another 8 million to finish
8:44construction.
8:46But, the towers stood. Two stone giants
8:50anchored to the riverbed, ready to hold
8:52the longest suspension bridge the world
8:54had ever seen.
8:56But, the bridge wasn't done yet. And the
8:58next disaster wasn't underwater. It was
9:01the cables.
9:03May 1877,
9:05the towers are up.
9:07Now they need to spin the wires.
9:10Each main cable would hold over 5,000
9:12individual steel wires bundled and
9:14squeezed under massive tension. Four
9:17cables total.
9:18The entire bridge would hang from them.
9:20If the steel failed, the bridge fell.
9:24This made the steel supplier the most
9:25important man on the project. His name
9:28was J. Lloyd Haigh. Charming guy,
9:31well-connected. Came in with a fair
9:34price. He was a fraud.
9:36Haigh supplied weak, brittle wire while
9:39swapping out inspected batches in a
9:41South Brooklyn warehouse.
9:43By the time Washington Roebling's
9:45engineers caught him, 221 tons of
9:48defective steel were already spun into
9:50the main cables.
9:52The problem is, you can't un-spin a
9:55suspension cable.
9:56Once those wires are bundled, tensioned,
9:59wrapped, and locked in, they're
10:00permanent.
10:02You'd have to tear the whole bridge
10:03apart to remove them.
10:05Roebling did the only thing he could. He
10:08left the bad steel inside and ordered
10:10150 extra wires added to each cable.
10:14High paid for every one of them.
10:17High's bad steel is still inside the
10:19Brooklyn Bridge today, right now, as you
10:21watch this. The bridge has been holding
10:23it up for 140 years.
10:26With the four massive cables stretched
10:28across the river, the bridge finally had
10:31something to hang from.
10:32Now came the part that would turn it
10:34into a structure.
10:36High above the water, workers began
10:38assembling the roadway, one piece at a
10:40time, suspended in midair.
10:43Six enormous trusses, each about 33 ft
10:47deep, ran the length of the bridge,
10:49locked together by crossbeams into a
10:51rigid triangulated spine.
10:53This web truss design insisted on by
10:56John A. Roebling turned a flexible
10:58suspension bridge into something far
11:00more stable.
11:02By early 1883, the skeleton was
11:04complete, a lattice of steel suspended
11:07in the sky, ready to carry nearly 17,000
11:10metric tons of load. All that remained
11:14was the surface.
11:15A central elevated promenade for
11:17pedestrians running above two outer
11:19roadways for carriages and two inner
11:22tracks for trains.
11:23The bridge was no longer an idea. It was
11:26ready to open.
11:28May 24th, 1883.
11:31After 13 years, 4 months, and 15 and 1/2
11:35million dollars, the Brooklyn Bridge
11:38opened to the public.
11:40It was called the New York and Brooklyn
11:42Bridge, and wouldn't be renamed until
11:451915.
11:46An estimated 150,000 people crossed the
11:49bridge that day.
11:51President Chester A. Arthur walked its
11:54length beaming.
11:55That night, a massive fireworks display
11:58lit up the East River. The papers called
12:00it the eighth wonder of the world.
12:03Six days later, the celebration turned
12:06into a disaster.
12:08Roughly 20,000 people packed the narrow
12:10wooden promenade. Then, a woman tripped.
12:14Someone, maybe seeing her fall, maybe
12:16just feeling the bridge's natural sway,
12:19screamed. The crowd erupted. [music]
12:21Those behind pushed forward. Those in
12:24front, hearing the scream, tried to push
12:26back.
12:2812 were crushed to death against the
12:30iron railings or trampled on the stairs.
12:3435 more were maimed or seriously
12:36injured.
12:37Public confidence in the bridge
12:39collapsed overnight. People stopped
12:41crossing it. They were terrified. The
12:44disaster left New York terrified that
12:46the bridge was a death trap.
12:49Then came one of the most famous
12:50publicity [music] stunts in American
12:52history.
12:53The greatest showman in America, P.T.
12:55Barnum, had a problem, too.
12:58The city had refused to let his circus
13:00parade across the bridge earlier that
13:02year. He took it personally.
13:05But when Barnum got his revenge a year
13:07later, the bridge got its rescue at the
13:09same time.
13:11After the stampede had eroded public
13:13trust in the bridge, the city came back
13:15to him.
13:17On May 17th, 1884, P.T. Barnum led 21
13:21elephants across the Brooklyn Bridge.
13:23Bringing up the rear was Jumbo, the most
13:25famous elephant in the world.
13:28If elephants could cross it safely,
13:30surely people could, too. It worked. The
13:33fear dissolved. The crowds returned.
13:36But, familiarity doesn't mean
13:37understanding.
13:39The Brooklyn Bridge still keeps secrets.
13:41Here's something most New Yorkers don't
13:43know.
13:44Inside both stone anchorages, those
13:46massive granite blocks at each end of
13:48the bridge, there are vaulted chambers.
13:51For decades, the city rented them out as
13:54wine cellars.
13:55Champagne, imported wine, all stored
13:58inside the foundations of the Brooklyn
14:00Bridge.
14:02The vaults had inscriptions on the
14:03walls. "Who loveth not wine, women, and
14:06song, he remaineth a fool his whole life
14:08long."
14:10Then in 2006, workers exploring one of
14:13the chambers found something nobody
14:15expected. A Cold War fallout shelter,
14:18sealed off and forgotten.
14:21Stocked with water drums, medical
14:23supplies, and survival crackers, all
14:26dated 1957
14:28and 1962.
14:30The Brooklyn Bridge has been hiding a
14:31doomsday bunker for half a century, and
14:34nobody knew.
14:36Now, let's go back to where we started.
14:38The Brooklyn Bridge was the impossible
14:40thing of its age, built by people who
14:42had no business attempting it, with
14:44technology that barely existed, at a
14:46cost that broke bodies and budgets and
14:49an entire family.
14:50And 143 years later, it's still
14:53standing.
14:54So, here are my questions for you.
14:57What is the impossible thing of our age?
14:59And who's going to be brave enough to
15:01climb into the next hell box to build
15:03it?
15:04If you want more stories like this, the
15:06ones they don't teach you in school,
15:08stick around. We've got a whole channel
15:10of them. Hit subscribe. We'll see you in
15:12the next one.

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