Science Gone Wrong

Unit mix-ups, whale explosions, radioactive tonics — when good intentions met bad outcomes.

13 stories

• The Superheavy Element That Only Existed in One Scientist's Data
• The Time a Falling Space Station Got a $400 Littering Ticket
• The Time Oregon Blew Up a Whale With Half a Ton of Dynamite
• The Toad Australia Released to Fight a Pest — and Turned Into a Bigger One
• The Weedkiller That Made New Zealand's Trousers Explode
• Piltdown Man: The Fake Fossil That Fooled Science for 40 Years
• The Radioactive Tonic That Dissolved a Millionaire's Jaw
• The Chemist Who Put Lead in Gasoline and Holes in the Ozone
• The Copper Tools That Scraped History Off the Parthenon Marbles
• The Day a 25-Foot Wave of Molasses Flooded a Boston Neighborhood
• The 'Demon Core': The Plutonium Sphere That Killed Two Scientists
• Galloping Gertie: The Bridge That Taught Engineers to Fear the Wind
• The Unit Mix-Up That Doomed a Mars Probe

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