On a fog-blanketed Saturday morning in July 1945, a B-25 Mitchell bomber flew blind through the Manhattan skyline and slammed directly into the 78th and 80th floors of the Empire State Building. It sounds like a disaster movie, but every detail is historical record.

This episode unpacks how a routine military transport ended in catastrophe, why the over-engineered skyscraper survived a direct hit, and how the tragedy reshaped American law forever. From a miraculous 75-story elevator survival to the dismantling of sovereign immunity, it's a story of engineering, human error, and fate colliding at 940 a.m.

• How zero-visibility fog and spatial disorientation led pilot Lieutenant Colonel William Smith to make one fatal wrong turn past the Chrysler Building
• Why the 1930s steel-frame design, built to withstand hurricane winds, a ...