6 In 1988, due to a communication gap and shift change, the staff on the Piper Bravo Oil Rig were not aware of the lack of a safety valve in one of the pumps. As a result, gas started leaking out leading to a huge explosion killing 167 people and $3.4 billion in damages.

Pier Alpha was an oil and gas production platform located in the North Sea. At one time it was Britain’s largest single oil and gas producing platform. The explosion on the rig occurred during a series of construction and upgrading work.

On 6 July 1988 at 12 in the afternoon, the pressure safety valve of one of the pumps was removed for routine maintenance. Since the work could not be completed before the shift ended, it was temporarily sealed, but the safety valve was not set in place.

During the shift change, a lack of communication occurred and the staff of next shift was not aware of the lack of safety valve. At 9:55 pm the pump lacking the safety valve was turned on. Soon gas began leaking out and ignited. The firewalls on the oil platform failed to control the fire causing an explosion which killed 167 people. (1,2)

7 English soldier Henry Tandey came face to face with young Adolf Hitler on a French battlefield during WWI but decided to spare the wounded soldier’s life. Had Tandey shot Hitler that day, the world would have been saved from one of the most reviled dictators and mass murderer of all time.

In 1938, a British war hero of First World War, Henry Tandey, received a phone call from Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. The Prime Minister had just returned from Germany after a fruitless meeting with Hitler to persuade him not to start another war.

In Germany, Chamberlain was invited to Bavaria, Hitler’s hilltop retreat, where he was shown a reproduction of the famous painting “The Menin Crossroads.” The painting depicted a soldier carrying his wounded comrade on his back at the Battle of Ypres in 1914. The man carrying the wounded soldier was Henry Tandey.

During the phone conversation, Chamberlain told Tandey that Hitler has recognized him as the man who had spared his life in a battlefield twenty years ago.

According to Hitler, on September 28, 1918, Private Henry Tandey was serving near a French village where he encountered a wounded German soldier. But instead of shooting him, Tandey let him go. The then 29-year-old soldier was Adolf Hitler. (1,2)

8 The biggest fire in California history, the Cedar Fire, was caused by a hunter while he was putting out flares but ended up in spreading the fires over 270,000 hectares costing the lives of 15 people and an estimated loss of $1.5 Billion.

The story of Cedar Fire began on 25 October 2003. Sergio Martinez, a hunter from West Covina, was lost in the Cedar Creek Falls of Cleveland National Forest after being separated from his partner. As the sun started going down, Martinez lit a signal flare and sent it high into the sky to mark his location.

By then, his partner had called for help on a cell phone. As help was approaching, a person who resided near the forest noticed smoke. When he called 911, he was told that it’s nothing and the police already know about it.

But by 5:38 p.m., calls started pouring into 911 reporting the growing blaze. When San Diego CountySheriff’s Deputy Dave Weldon arrived in his helicopter, the flames covered an area about the size of half a football field. He radioed for air tankers and helicopters. At 6:05 p.m. he found the lost hunter Martinez and carried him to the helicopter as he could not walk due to exhaustion.

The fire signal sent by Martinez on 25 October started the Cedar fire burning 280,278 acres of land, destroying 2,820 buildings, and killing 15 people before being finally contained on 4 November 2003. It still remains one of the largest wildfires in California history.(1,2,3)

9 German war general Field Marshall Erwin Rommel was at home celebrating his wife’s birthday when Allies launched the D-day attack. Left without their finest tactician, the German soldiers could not launch an effective counter-attack leading to the Allied victory on the Western Front.

The Normandy landing on 6 June 1944 was the largest seaborne invasion and marked the beginning of the Allied victory on the Western Front. The successful invasion of D-day is credited to two things: the weak weather forecasting system of Nazis and the birthday of Mrs. Rommel.

According to the Allied forecasters, the weather would improve sufficiently on June 6 to allow landing. But the German forecasters failed to predict the improvement in the weather. Believing that the weather was too bad to make an attack, Rommel went home to celebrate his wife’s birthday.

On the same day, many senior commanders of The Seventh Army, which was in charge of the defense of Normandy, went away to Rennes for a war game. Thus, when the Allied force landed in Normandy on June 6, the Nazis were caught off-guard.

Rommel received the information of the landing on the morning of June 6. He started back immediately but couldn’t reach Normandy before evening. By that time the Allies had successfully established themselves on all five major landing areas which later proved to be the most important factor in their victory.(1,2,3)

10 As it was very difficult for the Russian empire to maintain its territory in Alaska, they sold it to America for $7.2 million. About 20 years later, huge oil and natural gas reserves were discovered underneath. Alaska is now worth billions and billions of dollars more than the price at which it was purchased.

According to historians, the first Russian settlement in Alaska began in the 17th century. Since then, Alaska remained a part of Russian territory until the late 19th century. During this time, the Russian Empire was finding it hard to maintain its foothold in Alaska due to the constant threat of a war with its enemy, the British Empire. So, Russia negotiated with the US and sold Alaska on March 30, 1867, for 7.2 million dollars.

When Russia sold Alaska, it was believed that there was not much which could be gained from this piece of land. But that notion turned out to be false after the discovery of oil at Prudhoe Bay in 1968. Since then, huge reserves of oil have increased the value of Alaska several times more than the initial price for which the US purchased it.

Recently, in 2017, about 1.2 billion barrels of oil have been discovered and is considered as the biggest onshore discovery in the US in three decades.(1,2,3)