The artist David Bomberg and Britain's biggest ever explosion

Until February 4, the Pallant House Gallery in Chichester is hosting an exhibition by the British Artist David Bomberg (above is one of his pictures - Sappers at Work). In both world wars, Bomberg had a go at being an official war artist, but most of his pictures were rejected.

But the exhibition does feature two he painted of a huge Second World War bomb store in a former gypsum mine at Fauld in Staffordshire between Uttoxeter and Burton upon Trent. Nearly 15,000 tons of bombs were held there.

On the morning of 27 November 1944, the biggest man-made explosion ever in Britain ripped through the store, killing 70 people. A farm above the site just disappeared, nearly every house in the nearby village of Hanbury was damaged, while at Burton 6 miles away, 140 buildings suffered.

The Germans claimed they had hit it with one of the new V weapons, and there were also suspicions that perhaps it was sabotage by Italian prisoners of war or the IRA. But a secret inquiry concluded that shoddy work practices were to blame. It seemed that chipping away at a defective bomb with a brass chisel had caused an initial blast which was then followed by a second in which nearly 4,000 bombs exploded.

For more, see A Disastrous History of Britain.

Latvian supermarket collapse

At least 32 people have been killed after the roof of a supermarket collapsed in the Latvian capital, Riga. Three of the dead were emergency workers, and there are fears that more people could be trapped inside. It is the country’s worst disaster since it gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

The supermarket won an architectural prize when it opened just a couple of years ago, and the cause of the collapse is unclear, though there are reports that a garden was being built on the roof. Police are investigating to see whether there have been any breaches of building regulations.

Relatives have been asked to call the mobile phone numbers of those still missing to help rescue services locate them in the rubble. Witnesses said customers tried to run out when the roof started to collapse, but that the supermarket's electronic doors closed, trapping them inside.

Probably the deadliest store collapse of all time happened in the South Korean capital, Seoul, in 1995, when the five-storey Sampoong department store collapsed, killing 501 people. A police investigation revealed that it had been built with sub-standard cement and had been inadequately reinforced. For the full story, see A Disastrous History of the World. 

Store collapses

A search is still going on for any survivors in the Melcom store building in Ghana’s capital, Accra, 48 hours after it collapsed, amid reports of voices being heard from the rubble.    So far 9 bodies have been recovered, and 69 people taken out alive.

Officials from Ghana's National Disaster Management Organization have said the building had poor quality foundations, and Ghana’s president, John Dramani Mahama, has said anyone found to have been negligent ‘will pay a price’.

A property developer who had been wanted for questioning has given himself up, declaring: ‘There is no way I will put up a building and do shoddy work.’  The president has declared the site a disaster zone and suspended his campaign for next month's elections.

Perhaps the deadliest store collapse in history happened at the Sampoong department store in Seoul, South Korea, in 1995.   Cracks had been appearing in the structure for weeks before it crashed down, causing the deaths of more than 500 people.