Episode notes
What happens when a brewery's biggest vat... becomes London's biggest disaster?
Forget floods of water; imagine a tsunami of sticky, dark ale surging through narrow city streets. This isn't just a historical footnote; it's a true, utterly bizarre, and shockingly destructive event that hit London in 1814, earning it a prime spot on our "absurd calamity" scale.
Picture a bustling brewery, colossal vats brimming with porter beer, then, in an instant, a catastrophic rupture unleashing hundreds of thousands of gallons. Witness the chaos as a frothing wave of beer smashes through houses, demolishes pubs, and sweeps unsuspecting residents into its depths.
This is the mind-boggling tale of The London Beer Flood – a sticky, tragic, yet undeniably "what-the-heck?" moment ...