On Sunday, 28 December 1879, the 5.27 mail and passenger train from Burntisland to Dundee went out across the world's longest bridge on a black, fierce night, only to be dashed to pieces in the River Tay as the bridge collapsed during one of the worst storms in Scottish history. The Tay Bridge Disaster remains to this day the worst catastrophic failure of a civil engineering structure in Britain – the land equivalent of the Titanic sinking. In this book, author Robin Lumley brings a poignant human perspective to the fateful night in 1879 that shook Britain and the world of engineering to their core and sent a nation into mourning for the seventy-five souls lost to the dark, freezing waters of the River Tay. Packed full of personal tales and offering technical appendices for those who wish to further their specialised knowledge, Tay Bridge Disaster: The People's Story is a must-read for anyone interested in this tragic event in Scottish and British history.

Over 125 years ago, barely a year and a half after the Tay Railway Bridge was built, William McGonnagal composed his poem about the Tay Bridge Disaster, the poem about Britain’s worst-ever civil engineering disaster. Over 80 people lost their lives in the fall of the Tay Bridge, but how did it happen? The accident reports say that high wind and poor construction were to blame, but Peter Lewis, an Open University engineering professor, tells the real story of how the bridge so spectacularly collapsed in December 1879.

Over 125 years ago, barely a year and a half after the Tay Railway Bridge was built, William McGonnagal composed his poem about the Tay Bridge Disaster, the poem about Britain's worst-ever civil engineering disaster. Over 80 people lost their lives in the fall of the Tay Bridge, but how did it happen? The accident reports say that high wind and poor construction were to blame, but Peter Lewis, an Open University engineering professor, tells the real story of how the bridge so spectacularly collapsed in December 1879.

Death Came Swiftly is a fictional story inspired by the Tay Bridge disaster of December 1879, when a Scottish viaduct, the longest in the world, collapsed in a violent storm, killing all 74 passengers on a train.

"The novelist and poet Ben Lerner argues that our hatred of poetry is ultimately a sign of its nagging relevance"--

One hundred and thirty-five years after the event, the Tay Bridge Disaster remains the single most catastrophic collapse of a British engineering structure. The fateful day in 1879 shook Britain and the world of engineering to their core and sent a nation into mourning for the seventy-five souls lost to the dark, freezing waters of the Tay River. Here Lumley gives the collapse a much wider perspective than the event of one night by delving into the lives of those lost to the disaster, both passengers and railway workers, against a background of a wider Scottish history. Packed full of personal tales and with more technical appendices for those that wish to further their technical knowledge, The Tay Bridge Disaster is a must read for anyone interested in this poignant event of Scottish and British history.