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edscoble
You should read up on the Halifax explosion. While it wasn't an industrial accident - more a military one as it happened during the First World War and involved a shipment of explosives it was in many ways very similar (including roughly the same explosive yield).
Except that in Halifax the explosion vaporized so much water the harbour floor was briefly exposed, causing an 18 metre high tsunami as water rushed in to take its place. The main gun of the Mont-Blanc, the ship involved, was found three and a half miles away and the shank of its anchor (weighing half a tonne) two miles away. It's hard to get your head around the scale of it...