(via) On October 17th, 1814, a massive vat of porter beer exploded inside London’s huge Meux & Co’s Horse Shoe Brewery, causing a 15 ft high wave of beer (probably a million litres worth) to crash through the neighbouring slum of St. Giles, knocking down walls, flooding rooms and drowning eight people, three of them small children. The tragedy, detailed in this short animation from Simple History, became known as the London Beer Flood.