As I have said before, terrorists have nothing on human indifference, greed, and idiocy. 100 years ago today, the
General Slocum caught ablaze in NYC's East River while carrying 1,358 passengers (mostly women & children) to an annual picnic. 1,021 died.
The Slocum had 3,000 life preservers - plenty to spare. Unfortunately, they were all over ten years old and their cork filling had turned to dust - dust that soaked up the water and acted as a weight on the victims in the river.
Sure, 9/11 is now NYC's worst disaster in terms of pure numbers. As callous as this may seem however, someone was trying to kill them. But 100 years ago today, over 1,000 New Yorkers died because of sheer stupidity and greed. Our current administration wants to cut funding to police, firemen, and rescue workers.
Stupidity is still alive & well.
Today's NPR piece on the disaster:
http://www.npr.org/display_pages/features/feature_1958577.html