The Fall of the Tay Bridge

It took 600 men six years to build and was one of the longest bridges in the world. On its completion in 1878, famous visitors, including the Emperor of Brazil, Prince Leopold of the Belgians and Queen Victoria herself, came to pay homage to this marvel of Victorian engineering. Then, on the night of 28 December 1879, the unthinkable happened. Battered by an apocalyptic storm, the thirteen ‘high girders’ of the rail bridge over the Tay estuary fell headlong into the river below, carrying wit…