PEPCON EXPLOSION May 4, 1988, Henderson, Nevada.
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 5 ก.ย. 2024
- The Pacific Engineering and Production Company of Nevada (PEPCON) was a facility that manufactured an oxidizer named Ammonium Perchlorate, which was used in solid rocket booster engines. This video explains what happened on My 4, 1988 when two massive explosions completely destroyed the facility.
Here is a link to a video that captured the two giant explosions:
• Pepcon Explosion: Real...
It's almost shocking that humankind has made it this far with how lacking safety was in the past. Excellent video as always Forrest!
Thanks for watching!
I know lol west coast people are really dumb 😂
Safety means inefficiency and low production. It also means lower workplace moral because the men on the ground don't like pencil pushing safety freaks micromanaging their 8 hours. Lack of safety has brought us here and in the next generation we get to find out where overly safe is going to get us.
Safety is still lacking. Not as much has changed as you think.
I never said it had changed if you read my comment. I basically said it's a miracle we are still populating earth with amount of ignorant things people have done.@@shrimpflea
Nothing like waking up to a new Forrest video
Good stuff, Forrest. Give the people some more videos, please.
Thank you 🙏 Working on it!
Fascinating! Of all the talk and stories surrounding the disaster, had no idea this happened just a year later. Thank you for another new video, Forrest.
Love these re-alignment map placements..Many "historical" sites are always marked as "somewhere, here".. Knowing the exact spot, especially in murder sites, intrigues many people, most who will never admit..
There's a British TV documentary where they figured out the exact spot the the great fire of London started in 1666. The existing plaque was off significantly. It just felt satisfying to me that they pinned it down, even though its not important in the grand scheme of things.
@@MakerInMotion Thankyou for that..I’ve always felt the same. even though knowing the exact spot will not change history, there is something so intriguing about that “exact spot” 🤣
The building you were able to use as marker to align the old photo is not the original building. The original building was flattened by the shockwave from the second large explosion.
At 6:51, the original building is behind and to the left of the PEPCON plant. The shockwave is so powerful we can see it radiate across the desert, and when it reaches the neighboring building, the building crumbles like a house of cards.
Evidently the neighboring company whose building was flattened rebuilt it with the same footprint.
Good catch!
The amount of effort you must put into your videos and the attention to detail never cease to amaze me. You're a brilliant storyteller Forrest 👍👍
Thank you. You’re very kind!
Best on YT! History lessons; on-site evidence; compassion for the deceased at the sites; just fantastic!
@@brycecrousore1985 Agreed. Years after, Forrest captures the time, place and solemnity of every event he covers to perfection. 👍👍
@@Knee-koDid you see the one where he visited the location of the plane crash that killed Clark Gable’s wife, Carole Lombard? He found actual wreckage still evident at the site.
Awesome revisit of that explosion, and the history surrounding it.
Thanks man!!!
I love the style of your videos with how you put lay the past over the present. It just shows how much things change with time (or in some cases, don't change). I honestly don't remember this incident even though I was old enough to. Interesting stuff as always , Forrest. Always love it when you post!
Thank you for your comment and kind words!
It's amazing how built up this area has become now. I remember this explosion on the TV news, I was just 3 years out of high school.
I'm just glad that I'm not the only person that has an obsession with Google Earth before and after comparisons. I've always loved your videos for years. Keep 'em coming buddy!
You make excellent videos. I found your channel when I was deep diving into the German Tourists in Death Valley. That adventure was riveting and informative, you truly knocked it out of the park. Now I always look forward to your excellent videos, thank you my friend!👍🏼☮️
Thank you for your support!!
On May 4, 1988 I was working at the Firestone tire store at the corner of Fremont and Sahara in Las Vegas. the explosion was so strong that it sucked out a huge plate grass window in the front of the store. The plate glass did not go into the store but into the parking lot. A fellow employee had moved all the customers and office staff out of the lobby of the building and had them in the open mechanical bays away from the glass front of the store. By happenstance I was on my final month of work there and was preparing to move to Seattle for a new job.
A suggestion would be the fact that Pepcon did move their entire production facility far out to uninhabited area of the desert well away from any towns
Between your videos, and Brad Bell's videos around LA, I learn so many interesting little tidbits I've never heard of in the usual mush on YT. Thanks for a great video!
I’m happy I can help!
I lived in Boulder City Nevada on B Hill just a few miles from the Pepcon Plant in Henderson. The mountain range separated Henderson and Boulder City.
Around noon sometime I heard what sounded like loud thunder and the windows rattled. The sky had been clear blue that day. I looked out my living room window and saw a black mushroom explosion cloud just above the mountain range. The cloud was going in the opposite direction from Boulder City. The were telling people to evacuate their homes because they weren't sure just what was in the cloud. They also told them if they stayed home to close all windows and doors. Unfortunately many homes had their windows blown out. Doors and garage doors tweaked and damaged. It wasn't safe to stay home.
It's sad that 2 people were killed and some injured. It happened during the lunch hour and many employees had left the premises.
It’s a good day when he uploads
Thank you 🙏!
Great detective work Forrest Haggerty. Filmmaking as well. Thank you.
Thank you kindly.
I watched this happen. I was working outside near the airport, but I lived in Henderson. I thought a plane had crashed. The explosion just absolutely rocked the valley! I was in a band as well, and my drummer lived in Green Valley, right next to the area where the 215 is today. His house was at least 2 miles away, and it still blew his garage door in and knocked his front wall out of place. Had his family been sitting in the den, they would have had a head full of glass. I wasn't allowed into Hendo for 2 days and had to stay at a friends apartment at UNLV. There was a huge, yellow toxic cloud hanging over that side of town. Very little wind, so it just sat there, slowly moving to the north by Sunrise Mtn. When we were able to return home, all the stuff in my room was all over the floor, and the A/C vent had shot right out of the wall from the pressure of the blast. Glass replacement companies made a ton of money that month. They worked all night long! A friend of mine worked at Pepcon, but called out that day. He said there were employees wandering in the desert like zombies after the blast, completely knocked senseless. The paramedics had to go find them. It was insane how powerful this was. The film doesn't do it justice.
Thank you for sharing!
Man that was a heck of a BANG!🤯 Sorry about the poor guys that died not knowing what they were involved with that day RIP
Your enthusiasm really shines through in these videos Forrest. 👍
Thank you. Glad you like them!
You could post videos everyday, and I'd never miss a single one! You do such great work!
This format of content is damn near perfect. I enjoy the hell out of it
I didn't realize that I live 1.9 miles away from the explosion. Thank you so much for sharing this. I had no clue.
Cool video, never heard of this before. Thanks for sharing
Thanks for watching!
My favorite TH-cam channel. Always learn something interesting from Forrest.
Thank you very, very much!!!
I lived in Henderson for a few years but moved back to CA a couple years before this happened. I had applied for a job there (didn't get it thankfully). Still had lots of friends living there, heard the stories. One friend made a pretty good living for the next couple of years as a handy man repairing blast damaged houses.
Excellent video Forrest!! Still rewatch your PSA 182 and Germans lost in the desert videos! Thank you!
Glad you like them! Thank you.
Another incredibly interesting report, I love the fine details you pay attention to. The event itself is powerful when you see the shockwave that caused this explosion.
Perhaps an interesting note, I am German, at 21 September 1921 the largest explosion in Germany took place at the BASF factory in Ludwigshafen. Many deaths and great destruction caused by an ammonium nitrate (fertilizer) explosion. Thank you Sir and keep up your work. 👍
Thank you for your comment 🙏
Your videos are so fascinating, I look forward to every single one of your Productions Mr Haggerty… LOVE IT Who else is surprised that they would put a big housing complex and all these businesses in a ammonium perchlorate contaminated desert area literally 20 years after the explosion? Are there long term Health Ramifications?
I think they deep cleaned the area before building.
Crazy to see how populated the area came to be. The video of the explosion made it look so remote compared to now.
The best and most detailed video on the Vegas PEPCON explosion.
Thanks for all the work that went into making this video.
The video tape of the explosion was made by an engineer who was in charge of constructing one of the radio towers seen at 11:15. He was making a video of the towers construction when the PEPCON fire started, and turned the camera towards the fire.
Thank you! I didn’t know that.
I was working at the Flamingo Hilton when this happened, we definitely felt it, we all went outside , but a few of us ran up to the roof, nobody really knew what happened until we got home to watch the news, no social media.
It's like switching from past to present amazing well done video
Wow, I moved to Las Vegas about 3 years ago and from LV to Henderson 10 months ago. I live on the other side of 515 on the eastern edge of Henderson maybe 6 miles or so from there. I remember when that happened and I’ve seen that video a couple of times but I had no idea that it was that spot, as you pointed out the area is completely developed now and looks nothing like the open desert it was in 1988. I am blown away (pardon pun) thanks for making this video.
Thank you for your comment!
Thanks, Forrest. I watched the original video that you linked to. My, how it's grown over the years. What a terrifying event.
I agree!
Always great to see a notification from you. Awesome stuff.
I appreciate that! Thank you 🙏
ive seen that vid many times and searched around google maps a bit, but was never able to pinpoint the spot bc historical images from the area during that time sucks on Google Earth.
love having you cover this
I’m happy I could help!
It's crazy to see how much Las Vegas has grown. Luckily that production plant was way out in the desert at the time of that explosion. Hopefully many lessons were learned after that event. Great video!
It amazes me everytime you are able to find these famous and obscure events, find the stories to those events and with great accuracy show the locations of said events. Amazing work keep it up!!
Glad you like them!
I was in 3rd grade at Doris French Elementary in Las Vegas. Got rocked by the first explosion and my class left the classroom and saw the second explosion to the East. Remember there being a Marshmallow (Kidd) Business there too.
I bet that was frightening.
@@forresthaggertychannel4301 Love your videos, man! The respect and attention to detail is bar none!
Great video Forrest 👍 thanks for sharing and keep up the good work! Your videos are some of the only videos I find myself interested in enough to always sit through entirely and not skip around or fast forward 😂
Thank you for your honest feedback.
I'm always intrigued to be standing near or exactly where a large event happened so I really admire and appreciate your perspective. Very well designed video that not only tells the whole story but is respectful to the people of the past it affected as well as preserving the peace and anonymity of people that reside in those places today. Really great work man and really appreciate it.
Always informative and interesting, thank you. I'll bet there are still passengers of that Boeing telling the story of that landing!
Very possible! Unless they thought it was just turbulence.
It's crazy how so much can change in a few decades, even just seeing my hometown evolve since I was a kid, and neighboring towns.
i always get so stoked when i see a new post from you!
Thank you for the compliment!
Thanks for making this. Nice job on the overlay to locate the original structures. When I saw all the homes at the beginning, at first I thought they were already there.
Thankfully that was not the case in the late 80s. New sub. I look forward to your other works. Thanks for posting, I have vague memories of this incident.
Thank you for your comment and support 🙏!
I've gone there myself at night just to get a feel of that very historic spot. But what's crazy is that I've eaten at the Roberto's in that same lot several times beforehand and was mindblown when I came to find out that that was literally the area where Pepcon once stood. I've known about Pepcon before that, but I used to think that it was in the same area as TIMET Titanium plant till I looked it up and saw that it's by Gibson and American Pacific. It's crazy! Would be nice if they had some sort of memorial or any type of shrine dedicated to such a historical spot like Pepcon.
Another great video. Thank you!
If that happened now, there'd be about 1,000 casualties, thank God it was pretty empty back then.
Pleasant surprise to see a new vid today.....👍👍 You need to go back and give us a behind the scene's video on the upcoming F1 race....that would be awesome!
Where is the F1 race?
It's on November 18th in Las Vegas.
That’s too bad! I’m actually busy that weekend.
Always happy to see an upload from you 🙂👍
Hope you're doing well!♥
Thank you 🙏! So far I’m doing great. Retirement is a good thing!
Yes. We lived in Henderson at the time of the Pepcon Explosion. It shattered the windows on our house, blew in our garage door and front door, and bowed our sliding glass door on 554 Chelsea Drive off Sunset Road. It was hard finding plywood to board up all the windows that were shattered in the area. We had to evacuate our home for 12 hours. Motorcycle police were driving around with gas masks using bull horns to evacuate everyone. I ran out of my house with a large trash bag filled with clothes, food, diapers, and medicine, and the police thought I was looting. I definitely looked like I was. I had to show him my drivers license showing I lived there and he let me go. The neighborhood looked like a war zone for a while with all the boarded up windows and garage doors. Twilight zone for sure!
We drove over to the site the next day and took some pictures, and we were stopped by a security guard who almost confiscated my camera.
Wow!!! Very interesting. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks Forrest ❤ great video as always.
Thank you Richard! And thank you for the tip. I will use it on my next venture. 🙏
Thank you. RIP to those that lost their lives. The way it has been built up it looks like the land was more valuable and needed for what is there now.
Outstanding research and video. Great job. Totally fascinating.
im really happy to see another video from you
Great video! I live in Henderson and now finally understand where and how it happened.
Great to hear! Thank you for sharing.
Also I remember when they built the 215 interchange they had to stop a few times because the soil still tested positive for pro chlorate. I shared your video on my Nextdoor app in Henderson.
As always perfect Forrest, thank you!
Forrest, I really enjoy your videos and look forward to each one that comes out. Thank you.
I've missed Forrest's videos so much.
Very informative. Thank you 👍
Never stop making videos! Very interesting suff!
always great video brother from the imperial county California 👍👍🇺🇲
Thank you! I might do a General George Patton Desert Center series.
Another brilliant video Mr Haggerty! Stay safe my friend
Great video! I remember when this happened. I've been to the Marshmallow factory there, but that was in very early 90's.
How far apart are they?
My favorite channel on TH-cam!!!!!!!
Fascinating to me how there’s an entire city there now. From the original blast video it looks like empty desert
I sure wouldn't want to live around there. I wonder if they check the ground for contamination? I would think so. That stuff can cause thyroid problems.
I remember some of the first responders saying they were tossed quite a distance from the shock wave and it destroyed a fire truck. Messed up a whole bunch of vehicles. Really amazing there were only 2 deaths. It says "Two of the explosions were the equivalent of more than 2 kilotons of TNT, which registered at 3.0 and 3.5 on the Richter scale at Caltech University in California."
There was a school that took a lot of damage nearby too. I don't remember anyone being in injured there.
Forrest, you are missed! Please return. Hope you are well.
Working on a Zodiac Killer video.
I lived there at the time. I was working outside when it went off. From the map I was 12 miles away. There was a huge Mushroom cloud and from where I was and the cloud was it lined up with Hoover Dam. I was sure Russia blew up Hoover Dam, shortly after the first expl. there was another. Then we heard on an A.M. radio what actually happened. The ground shook and it was pretty loud but far away sounding. Good video, I forgot about that incident.
Another video! You're my personal historian Forrest!
Hahaha…. I’m honored!!!
Great info Forrest, brilliant stuff that was one BIG bang. Must of been like getting hit with the death star. Especially with it being on May the fourth.
Wow, interesting, I knew about this incident but I didn’t know that one original building still exists, we live just a few miles from there.
I need more Forrest Hagerty videos in my life!
Outstanding work , you’d make one heck of a land surveyor or civil engineer 👍🇺🇸
Hey Forest. I'm home from work and you've made my day. Thanks for the detail and work you put into your videos, I love 'em. A big fan from over the pond. Have a great day fella.
Awesome, thank you! And thank you for your kind comment!
Welcome to Henderson. Being part of the community this has fascinated me for a long while. Now the Forrest Haggerty channel is going to break it down for me! I am giddy. I love this channel. Worked about 1000 ft from the first blast and never knew. P.s. Do the Payne Stewart plane crash!
Wonderfully Informative yet again, Very many thanks.
Always enjoy your videos
I appreciate that! Thank you 🙏
i love your channel and videos thank you Forrest lad
Thank you for your kindness!
Thank you.
You're welcome!
I'm highly suspicious that any building could survive such a detonation of explosives. You only need to look at other high yield similar events and nothing survives.
I think the building was destroyed, but they rebuilt it on the same foundation.
Another interesting Video. Thank you Forest.
I’m glad you’re back. Keep up the great work. I love your videos.
Thank you so much!
Love your work
Thank you!
Watching your videos from Manchester UK.
Hello Manchester and thank you 🙏!
Another #slamdunk.Thanks for researching and sharing this information Forrest!!
Great overlays.
I was in Henderson last week, was wondering where the site had been.
Best channel on YT
Thank you 🙏!
Hello from Yorkshire:)
Hello and thank you!
@@forresthaggertychannel4301 I love your videos, i really liked the OKC mcveigh video. fascinating.
Thank you 🙏! I will make videos as long as I’m able to or until God takes me out!:)))
Forrest is the Google Earth 🐐
You’re too kind!
Hi Forrest I love the videos! It would be interesting to hear your take on the last Japanese banzai attack on Saipan.
Very interesting. If I may suggest, there is Lauren Elder 1976 plane crash site, which I think still unknown, somewhere in Nevada Triangle. I find her survival story quite intriguing. There is TV movie on TH-cam "And I Alone Survived 1978". Keep up the good work. Thanks for sharing.
I vaguely recall hearing about this accident
Interesting. Quality as always
thank you.
You're welcome
Always good stuff from you 👍🇺🇸
Thank you 🙏!
Your channel is amazing I've been binging it all day. Could you do a video on Randy Savage's death, please?
Hi Forrest, update on the FSU law Professor murder if you haven't been following it. The Ferrari driving oral surgeon brother just got sentenced to life in prison for his role as mastermind. The mother was just arrested at the airport boarding a one-way flight to non-extraditable Vietnam and is now sitting in jail with no bond until her murder trial.
If you had the time to make a video on MH370, myself and the community interested in the missing aircraft would be very interested. The way you put videos together make things very clear. Thank you for the videos brother! Havent found a better way to learn things yet!