The 1929 Cleveland Clinic Disaster

The Cleveland Clinic had been open for eight years when it was nearly destroyed in a single morning. On May fifteenth, nineteen twenty-nine, nitrocellulose film stored in the basement of the clinic caught fire. There were at least four thousand two hundred pounds of the film down there, possibly as much as ten thousand pounds. Investigators were never able to determine exactly what ignited it, though theories included a dropped match or cigarette and a light left too close to the stacked film. The gas it produced was yellowish-brown, toxic, and heavier than air.

The gas moved up through the building. Patients, visitors, and staff had no warning. Many collapsed in hallways and stairwells. Others made it outside but had already inhaled lethal doses. The gas ignited several times as it spread, producing explosions that could be heard blocks away.

When it was over, one hundred twenty-three people were dead. Among them was Dr. John Phillips, one of the four physicians who had founded the clinic eight years earlier. Eighty patients and visitors died. Forty-three clinic employees died. Ninety-two more were injured.

It remains the worst hospital disaster in American history. The nitrocellulose film that caused it was standard medical-imaging technology of the era, and the dangers of storing it in large quantities in confined spaces were not widely understood. The disaster forced a national reassessment of storage standards for radiological film and other hazardous materials in medical facilities.

The clinic rebuilt. It is now one of the largest and most renowned medical institutions in the world, ranked consistently among the top hospitals in the country. The building where the disaster occurred is gone. The institution that rebuilt itself after it is still here.