The tide gave Stevenson two hours to build a lighthouse
Robert Stevenson built the Bell Rock lighthouse in the few hours the tide allowed each day.
Superprojects
Every big build has a side door.
One project a week, historic or still being built, through the one detail that makes it stick: a two-hour tide, a doubled pipe, a horse called Bassey. A new story every week.
The crane at Hinkley Point C was built for one job
Hinkley Point C's crane Big Carl, the largest in the world, was built for a single nuclear power station and nothing else.
The Thames Barrier's gates began life as a gas tap
Charles Draper designed the Thames Barrier's rotating gates after watching the tap on his own gas cooker.
A diver swam blind into the Severn Tunnel to shut a door
In November 1880 a diver wearing an early rebreather swam into the flooded Severn Tunnel to shut a door no one else could reach.
A shipworm taught Brunel how to tunnel under the Thames
Marc Brunel copied the Thames Tunnel's digging shield from the way a shipworm bores through ship's timbers.