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Super Structures of the World: Panama Canal

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deep in the jungles of Central America has battled nature to build an engineering Marvel the story continues to astonish us Dimensions to buy imagination which price civilized  is the crossroads of the world's economy to protect it America has gone to war kick the superstructure called the Panama Canal December 20th 1989  under cover of Darkness 20,000 American troops invade the tiny Central America nation of Panama as gunfire shatters the Stillness of the night Bader's pursue their prey General Manuel Panama's ruthless dictator in a suspected drug trafficker and every four days later Noriega surrenders United States declares victory but America is not for 20,000 lives at risk simply do a rat's one Mass noreaga iron grip on Panama threaten one of the world's most important superstructures the Panama Canal the canal was born as a fierce struggle between man and nature a battle that began at the dawn of the 20th century win America's greatest Engineers took on the biggest challenge of their lives and astonish the world  from 1904 to 1914 40,000 workers login blasted their way through some of the toughest rain on planet Earth  they dug the deepest ditch build the largest dam who are the biggest concrete structure the world ever seen they gave their sweat and they gave their blood San Gabriel live the Panama canal links the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans at the Isthmus of Panama I'm here 50 miles why narrowest point between North and South America  when a ship enters the canal from the Pacific Ocean to sets raised 85 feet above the sea at this elevation the ship sailed 9 miles through a man-made Channel car from an what is the Continental Divide send 23 more miles across the second largest man-made lake on Earth the nearest vehicle another set of locks lower than to sea level  by sailing through the Panama Canal save nearly 30 days the time it takes to sail around the tip of South America  Live 5 News years ago there was no need for a Panama Canal the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans North and South America then about 2 million years ago the ocean floor erupting 50 MI the volcanic rock arose between the scene he gets mr. Panama I was born  Dion's later men dream the reopening the ancient path between the ocean  50 miles but in Panama it wasn't me  cases for Panama which one of them are typical sites to take a general in the world with geologic if it has almost impenetrable jungle cover and enormously jumbled varieties of stone and Terrain the end of the 19th century men learn just how formidable of Isthmus of Panama could be the 1881 France undertook the world's first attempt to take a Panama Canal  confidence would good reason in charge was one of the greatest entrepreneurs of the day Ferdinand de lesseps adolescents who win 1869 had accomplished one of the most impressive engineering Feats of all time Excavating the Suez Canal across Egypt joining the Mediterranean with the Red Sea put the Suez was a ditch down to sea level in a flat deserts of Egypt sea level was a mere fifty people roll the ground  Mountain Panama 10 * fever  they move mountains to build the Panama Canal but they didn't have to remove the entire Mountain build a sea-level canal you would have literally had to have removed the entire mouth French Engineers began 1981 some eight years later they had excavated only a few miles of Earth  giant French russiaville weather in Panama swamp rusting in the Brandon get Indian it was not only massive Mountain defeated the French Europe's finest Engineers it also been vanquished by an almost to me today we know that mosquitoes transmit malaria and yellow fever deadly diseases man in teenage no one suspected these time insect to kill  ironic the French worry more about ants  in order to prevent ants from crawling up on the bed hospital patients they placed in a cup of water Namaz 8 month rainy season bread mosquitoes by the thousands by the thousands the French began to die people were dying so fast from yellow fever and malaria that when they brought you in the Friends Hospital the stories are that many the pine box the coffin was brought in before you actually.  In just eight year 20 mm mm the French Canal company died of disease  the horrific death toll was matched by Financial hemorrhaging Ferdinand de lesseps for $287 in Canal project and went bankrupt greatest financial disaster of the 19th century  in 1903 the exhausted gave up and sold their Panama excavations to a young nation which it just proven its engineering prowess by taming a continent the United States have been hubris to believe that it could succeed where the friends and failed many wondered if it could the Americans understood something to French is not  to drink it's Canal America would begin not with shovel but with test a doctor not an engineer would leave the way US Army physician Colonel William C gorgeous Panna mine 1904  gorgas was a controversial figure many dismissed his unorthodox methods of controlling disease Hardee's Milford to work brilliantly in Cuba after the Spanish-American War  in Panama Gorges assembled as weapons 3000 garbage cans 4000 buckets 1000 rooms 5000 lb of soap I'm 120 tons insecticide  he said battalions of workers into the streets and the swamps and the jungles of Panama everyday lives  draining puddles in other mosquito breeding grounds Gorges armies great thousands of gallons oil across X in swamps killing the insects larvae fumigate entire town again and again the corporate year-and-a-half but by Chris 1906 yellow fever and malaria have been virtually eliminated to this day the Canal Zone Remains the most disease-free strip of tropical landscape on Earth  when she gorgeous would only be the first of many brilliant man to tackle the challenge of building of Panama Canal he would be attached that would test the limits of each man's will ability for even without mosquitoes Panama remained a formidable geological challenge to dig their Canal American engine is now did the biggest and most expensive pink diamond ever in history  again and again they confronted seemingly insurmountable inventing new and ingenious ways to overcome them in 1992 Panama Canal Engineers began a massive 10-year excavation project stable blast 40 million cubic yards of Earth widening the canal Channel so today's guy play cargo vessels one another and its parts get the latest chapter in an engine ring Saga which began of the dawn of the 20th century  when the Americans began their canal in 1904 Engineers wait out of your plan it would take ten years to complete  that plan rebuilding one on the Atlantic and two on Pacific Superfly the canal with its water engineer would need to down the chakras the largest river in central Panama the lake created by the dam would make it unnecessary read to dig a canal all the way across Panama because I'm 23 miles across the lake  the between the lake and the Pacific lock Panama's rugged backbone this was the continental divide a nun chain of mountains in North America in the south hear the Canal builders would face their first jingle - 9 Mi long 300 ft wide and 350gt it would not be easy the Friendship tried to pierce this formidable barrier and fail the problem was didn't have cable Hills look like rock but they were so badly and they kept on sleeping digging a foundation for a house  to battle the Continental Divide America sent an unlikely champion his name was John Stevens Stevens would never build a canal he was a railroad man famous for laying track and black channels where no one else could we arrived in Panama in 1905 he was 15 years old and his bills over a thousand miles away in the United States  as much as any man live who could a railroad man in the world's toughest canal John Stevens Ponder the abandoned French excavation a shallow dish called the Culebra cut Zoom railroaders mind grass The crucial fact with the French hat  the key to conquering Culebra cut excavation transportation  one of the biggest technological challenges in completing the Panama Canal what today would probably be cold construction management systems engineering how to move all of the millions of cubic feet of the real that were being excavated because you can't you got to do something have to have a rail system transportation system that is very sophisticated and very adaptable under John's fever the 50-mile ride Isthmus of Panama with Dune race with over 450 miles of track  Intruder man Plies with Relentless efficiency edger Clayton flat cars raced away to jump inside a steady supply of empties ready for steam shovels to fill  but one difficulty remains  how to unload millions of cubic yards of finding dogs itching Solutions American simply invented one a three times. pool by a powerful winch along the length of a dirt train  in 10 minutes this ingenious device on loaded certain men with shovel could remove an hours the railroad called many problems for the Creator how to move miles of railroad track to keep up with the advancing steam shovels John Stevens invented a new device called the track shifter this simple but effective machine allow the railroad to follow the digging wherever it when what he did was surveying the moves along the track itself forward and the track in front of it lifting and moving in a couple of pizza besides then moving along the track and doing the same thing a little bit further on and on on the Johnson City Stadium plan of attack organize the canal excavations the headstrong Railroader abruptly quit he basically said that the difficult work working the organization in the design and that the construction itself was no big deal and then once it became nothing more than just a big construction project anyone else where he went off to rush up to find new challenges  Stevens departure. President Theodore Roosevelt the president of the job of digging the canal over the army colonel George W Goethals said Roosevelt he can quit unless I order into seconds classic West Point Social Security which themselves in the Army Corps of Engineers he would use his absolute authority to weld America's Canal diggers into a perfectly discipline human machine  he immediately put the whole come out under martial law and therefore could see what had to occur he didn't have to convince in 1908 go through the cruise the canal channel would be a full 50% wider than Steven has landed Jen mennie machine the salt of the Culebra cut leading the attack was 68 of the biggest earth moving he's ever built  giant 95 ton steam shovels made by the Milwaukee firm of who Cyrus each of these iron leviathans could scoop up tons of dirt  more than three times the capacity of the steam shovels used by the friend the gigantic shoveled of day and night into the Continental Divide filling a car load of dirt every planets  day after day the explosions never seen four hundred thousand pounds of dynamite 800 glass every Richard George gobel resolve the dispute at the the largest excavation ever made in the surface of the Earth  tourist flock to Panama and stare the mighty work before them people living at the time building from Canal was a kind of progress the clear evidence of the advantages of the United States overall it was clear to them that we were opening up a new newer The Better World all the time and the things going to get better at leaving Archer  what's the Panamanian not you to progress without a bitter fight Landslide railroad track in minutes of digging disappears miraculously Landslide killed only a few of the 6,000 men working in the Culebra cut Dynamite what's the difference Dory the blasting Crews were mostly black laborers recruited from Caribbean island  they did the most dangerous no one was sure how much Dynamite would need to block the cut every explosion with a matter of trial and error when there was an error men paid with their lives in the worst single action 23 men were killed when a massive Dynamite charge went off prematurely a worker the West Indies recalled the Flesh of men who through the air like birds the Culebra cut took year to complete longer than any other phase of the canal Construction but the battle between man and he gets me continue to this day today's canal Engineers have new weapons in their war against the ever-shifting Earth using satellites in global positioning system they track her movements with pinpoint precision the predicting landslides is not the same  engineered out there Rowlett animal ever end nature enthrone many obstacles in the canals path Culebra cut was only the first conquering challenges to make engineering history when American engineer and ignorant animal they had to decide what is the build of sea level or a lock canal  because it gets its water from the ocean sea-level Canal must be as deep as sea levels been in the mountains of Panama sea level is over 500 ft so the Americans rejected the French idea of digging the sea-level they plan to use rocks to raise shift 85 feet above the sink but building a lock Canal created a new problem to be solved engineered wood have to design and build locks capable of raising chips 85 ft no canal and ever lifted ships that high in theory the locks would need immensely powerful pumps to raise water and ship fight against the force of gravity  the Canal builders had no intention of struggling against they decided to make gravity work for them Australians aspect of the design of a locked are all the water that flows into them out of the gravity flow which means that they don't need pumps to exploit the force of downward flowing water canal Engineers first had to capture it in Panama that was easy 7.  Since time immemorial tropical downpours of soap the Isthmus of Panama over 10 feet of rainfall in a single year bloated by the cement rainfall the chagras river once roared unrestrained across central Panama from the mountains to the Sea wreaking havoc with its Flags  engineer's me that there could be no Panama Canal until they Attain stop  they calculated the to control the Raging River they would have to build an Earthen Dam 100 feet high and a mile and a half why the largest dam of its time it was a bold design and controversial  17 years old 89 what are America's largest Earthen Dam collapse after heavy moving with the force of Niagara Fall of wall of water swept through the nearby city of Johnstown Pennsylvania 2000 people drowned Johnstown with annihilated seeing another Johnstown some Americans question the wisdom of building the world's largest Earthen Dam in a country plagued by torrential rains birkenau Engineers insisted that their **** would hold Johnny 1906 Grand Am was finished in 1913 behind its massive wall the chopper turn on 164 square miles of jungle creating bathroom lake at the time the largest man-made lake in the world 23 miles long the lake provided nearly half the length of the canal  I gave the lock the immense amount of where they needed to operate the chocolate River was really the lifeblood of the whole series today provides the water bringing it in at the summit of the canal and driving it down through locks until it flows into the ocean tub doctor in Lake in 85 feet above sea level the force of gravity propelled is water downhill toward the sea put the canal three sets of locks cartoon locks on the Atlantic Pedro Miguel and Mira Flores on the Pacific hammock bathtub preventing the Lakes trillions of gallons of water from reaching sea level  two even lower the lock operator he only to open and close with the valve water seeking sea level into or out of the chamber's raising or lowering ships as it goes it takes 26 million forms of water to raise one ship and another 26 million to lower it  enough water to meet the needs of a large city to handle this enormous amount of water and accommodate the biggest ships of Canal Engineers with designed the largest concrete structures of their time so massive that no one was sure they could be built the Panama Canal locks call Design the today's of Norma ships can still travel with only inches before any ship Ventures into a lock Canal workers tether it's at for electric locomotive called mule with Travelon high voltage rail as the ship moved through the lock a canal pilot on Bartell's the mule drivers win the real in or let out table like fisherman playing in the norm is Marlon the locomotive keep the ship from hitting Rockwall it's a system that works as well today as it did in 1909 when Canal Engineers designed the lock chamber specific 2 biggest ships in the world  one of those ships was the brand new Battleship Pennsylvania 70 y + 600 feet long when finished she would be 883c long the biggest passenger ship of flow although the Rocks were design for her never sail through the Panama Canal her name RMS Titanic to accommodate the Titanic the lock Chambers would have to be the largest concrete structures in history 1 feet tall higher than a 6-story building  even today it's stood on its own a single lock would be fourth tallest structure on the Manhattan skyline top only by the Empire State and Chrysler Building and the World Trade Center only when the locks are drain for repair can we appreciate their awesome dimensions and understand why those who witness their construction compare them great cathedrals never had concrete been poured on such a matter Gayle no one was absolutely sure that he could problem with Cassidy Concrete in massive amounts concrete is an exoplanet materials in other we could gives off heat as a so the hotter it gets the more danger there is for the material to crack in the more volume you have some more dangerous to get things to crack 2 there were other problems engineer's were unsure exactly what mixture of gravel sand and water made for the strongest reported too late after mixing it would Saturn properly  most difficult of all building concrete that every detail of the lock had to be formed in wood and metal moles the lot Chambers would have to be cat like a Norman pottery  216 the Canal builders had to do something never done before poor millions of cubic yards absolute precision and perfect timing  chicken pox  but for the men the Panama Canal impossible was not enough engineer stretch steel cable between movable Towers from the cable how did Norm is bucket you told me six tons of specially Mix Concrete the towers travel back and forth the building site pouring concrete as they went the cable cranes were made of very large power mounted on track to travel along the axis of the Panama Canal the transporter way the transport is a concrete they were very quick to move across the same time into year using this system the canal will report and 1/2 million cubic yards of concrete volume equal to building a solid wall 8612 feet high and nearly 300 miles long today what is control concrete pouring but we still build huge concrete structures with the techniques and Equipment invented for the Panama Canal slot designer top their concrete pouring Triumph with yet another dazzling innovation in the age of nuclear power it's hard to imagine how electricity could have a maze our great-grandparents but at the beginning of the twentieth century it was a cutting-edge of energy technology electricity was a brand new energy for Edison had built the first electric generating plant in 1881 and this was just about 20 to 30 years after that I don't have electricity at the news on a building site that expense I'm like steam power electricity was insolent and precise with a touch of a button  turn on the blinking of an eye they travel through long wires to start compact Motors that drove immense machines huge turbines turn by the force of the chagras river towers 1500 electric motors with ran the locks of the Panama Canal an industrial world that ran on Steam and animal monthly prep the Panama Canal show the new electric power to do  concrete poured in electricity in play only one challenge meaning for the lock Builder the chamber Gates cheesecake had to be strong enough to hold back need to gallons of water  defeat the world's largest lock chamber they had to be the biggest La case ever built as tall is 6 story building to remain watertight the gates needed to open and close with flawless precision sure they had to be engineering miracles naturally strong get light as feathers and they were on dry land flock Gateway 7 in water it floats the Boyd Hollow Spring Mix the gate lighter than water important feature of the design of the Submachine remove a very heavy massive steel gate but really only have to move something that is the volumes in the water massive steel rods open and close each day turn the rods wheel diameter get incredibly cool Spruce that runs on a single 40 horsepower electric motor no more powerful than a motorcycle engine Gates were finished engineer's tried opening and closing them in the dry Rock Chambers at their full weight one of their Bruno to the strong as an ordinary door  grab was the heart of the lock electricity was there nervous system  engineer's gave him a brain the control for today the original control board building 1913 still run the loft each board is a tabletop model of the entire lock operation but I'm like a real brain it cannot make this unlock operator. Valve handle letting water in and out of Chambers opening and closing Gates the entire lock operation unfolded miniature before their eyes  everything that's happening correct sequence beneath the board control during geniusly interconnected no one can throw a switch or turn the valve out of if they do the lock operation stop clock system series of Fail-Safe device is more like the organization of the military campaigns exactly into another organization until the whole thing for the word if any organization of how to open an trapped Escape how to move ship through the canal it would work it would shut down after four years of construction the locks were finished by then the Panama Canal was finally Nearing Grecian the main 1913 to steam shovel those two nose in Culebra cut and excavator buckets of soil  the canal with finished all it needed was water  on October 10th in Washington DC President Woodrow Wilson press the button cross explosion 3000 miles away in Panama how to get the dynamite charges blue the final yards of Earth Sky High water from Gosling play crushing to the Culebra cut  the Panama Canal is in Doug as much for strategic military purposes for shipping rates in Spanish  in one of its most vulnerable Target on August 15th 1914 do USF Anton with the first ship to pass through the Panama Canal  a dream hundred years old to come to pass six months ahead of schedule and 4% but it was a dream with a staggering price in 10 years the United States $52 to build the Panama 5 times more than America exam Louisiana Purchase and all other territorial Acquisitions combined the cost in human lives with no left cheap  more than 5,000 American Deck nearly 5000 French 500 laws laws for every mile the Canal builders in carried out one of History's Greatest construction project and to wonder if they're accomplished what time  they could not know that within 50 years the Panama Canal with faded deadly peril at the end of World War II the crew of an American warship in Pacific to see what appeared to be monster rising from the deep  in fact it was a Japanese submarine 400 feet long the largest underwater vessel of its time lady 400 series submarine for something that's it the world has never seen or even before which was all of the almost twice the size of the largest Americans covering so this is quite an impressive machine examining the sub American Sailors discovered a strange to  can a long metal track the Japanese explained that the two was actually an airplane ingeniously designed to hold sea plane called like aeronautical origami the cimarons literally Ninja Turtle home once on the surface for Subs would launch their planes pausing them off their decks the top secret aircraft have been designed to perform only one mission Troy the Panama Canal the attack Plan called for a fleeting Giant. play Drop the Panamanian codes the plain farms and Torpedoes which hit the canal weakest Point got some **** and the lock game look at the canal with a drain like a nun  crippling America's ability to move Menon shift between two theaters of War  can you meet early days of the war now boner ability the US military put into action secret plan of its own 100 ft under the lock a maze of tunnels led to special items Project 7 67 West Norman's hydraulic jack this film offers a rare glimpse of sip 7 in action  push upward by the underground Jack the huge deal **** rises in a lock capable of holding back trillions of gallons of water the bomb ever shattered the lock Gates World War II ended before Japan could launch an attack against the Panama Canal instead it's Giant sub ended up attracting to US Navy today the National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC did restoring the last in the Panama Canal bombers the fear on aircraft are the only submarine base airplanes ever designs put in operation that were intended as an offensive weapon  the fair on that we have here in this museum is the only clue left in world of this weapon system they were very proud to have this because of the fretted it did show against the Panama Canal and what could have been at the close of the twentieth century much has changed at the Panama Canal the technology of the Future Wolf side by side the Innovations of the past Madisonville veteran Canal Pilots use state-of-the-art computer simulations to teach trainees how to avoid catastrophe or the hydrodynamic you know the interaction between the two checks today the biggest ship using the canals are called panamax several panamax ship are over 950 ft long and over 100 feet why the lock Chambers are 1,000 feet long and 110 feet wide there's literally no room for error you do a good job turn the lock and you can see the face of the master right away with a big smile and if you don't then you see him looking the other way the world is changing to beyond anything the Canal builders could have imagined the largest of the day super tankers and aircraft carriers are too big for the locks  there's talk of building high speed railroad the cross Center America to compete with a canal  23 year 2000 approaches and the canal passes from American to Panamanian ownership structure that won the world super Canal opened in 1914 nearly 800,000 shifts the past tearing over five billion tons of cargo oil leak computer Automobiles and vacationers flow perpetually through it 50 Mi Channel 15000 ships a year twenty-four hours a day 7 days a week 365 days a year as the 20th century ends no one expects the Panama Canal to fade into history can I tell you I have my other people who feel the same sometimes you go through the canal and you concentrate stop and think about it while you have it back look at one of the Hilton and I know you feel this incredible animation for this evening here nearly 100 years ago human beings took on one of Nature's greater challenges and one whatever its future hold the Panama Canal will always be a monument to that victory it will forever commemorate the media spirit and raw determination which Triumph odd

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Super Structures of the World: Panama Canal

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