Century After Halifax’s Great Explosion, City Marks Anniversary

To much of the world, this city is linked to the sinking of the Titanic because many of its victims’ bodies were brought here to Halifax to be buried.

But residents of Halifax, and Canadians in general, associate the city with an even more deadly maritime disaster — an explosion in 1917 after a seemingly minor harbor collision between a French munitions ship and a Norwegian vessel carrying food aid to Belgium.

The blast leveled much of the north end of the city, killed about 2,000 people and injured perhaps 10,000 others, including nearly 600 people who were blinded, mainly by shattered glass.