Mashhad Urban Railway began operation
Mashhad Urban Railway is a rapid transit urban rail line in Mashhad, Iran. It is the second rapid transit system in Iran. The project has been known by a number of terms, including "light rail" or "light metro" and "urban rail" or "metro", though the system's full-grade separation from traffic and five-minute headway fully qualify it as a rapid transit or "metro" system. Construction of the second line which is a metro line is ongoing. Limited operation of the first phase of line 2, with 10.1 kilometres (6.3 mi) and 9 stations, had just begun in Feb 2017. Tunnel excavation of the first phase of line 3 was started in 2015.
Big Bay Dam failure
Big Bay Dam was an earthen dam located 11 miles west of Purvis, Mississippi in Lamar County. On March 12, 2004 the Big Bay dam embankment failed through piping in the vicinity of the principal spillway 12 years after construction. A peak breach flow of 147,000 ft3/s (4,200 m3/s) was estimated from the breach geometry, breach timing and the reservoir volume. The Big Bay embankment, which is largely intact, is approximately 1890 feet long and 51.3 feet high. The failure occurred with an initial water surface about 6 inches (0.15 m) above the normal pool elevation of 278.0 ft (84.73 m), releasing 14,200 ac-ft (17,500,000 m3) of water and inundating 14.3 miles (23.0 km) of valley to depths of up to 33 ft (10 m) from the dam to the Pearl River.
Turenki rail accident
The Turenki rail accident occurred on 12 March 1940, at 05:28 local time (03:28 UTC) near Turenki, Finland, and remains the worst rail accident in Finnish history causing 39 people dea and 69 injured. The accident was caused by a signalling error; the signaller, who was still on probation and who had been awake for the past 36 hours, mistakenly cleared the freight train to pass Turenki north towards the Harviala railway station, even though the troop train had already passed the latter station which had been chosen as the place the two trains would pass each other.
St. Francis Dam collapse
The St. Francis Dam was a concrete gravity dam located in San Francisquito Canyon in northern Los Angeles County, California that was built between 1924 and 1926 to serve the city of Los Angeles's growing water needs. It failed catastrophically in 1928 due to a defective soil foundation and design flaws, unleashing a flood that claimed the lives of at least 431 people. The collapse of the dam is considered to have been one of the worst American civil engineering disasters of the 20th century, and remains the 3rd-greatest loss of life in California's history, exceeded only by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire and the Great Flood of 1862.
