During the Second World War the allies spent, roughly, a staggering 3 and a half trillion (2023 adjusted) US dollars on munitions. Those munitions had to be manufactured, stored, and transported, creating notable risk to everyone in their path. That risk became all too real in rural Staffordshire, UK, on November 27, 1944.
During the civil war, the manufacture of powder and explosives was often handled by the most vulnerable, young women and children, whose labor was needed when so many men had been sent off to war. On March 13, 1863, the confederacy experienced a munitions disaster, in the confederate capitol of Richmond.