Inventions lead to progress and lead to other inventions. They increase our knowledge about the world we live in. Inventions tell us the extents of a Human brain and its capabilities. But to know and to learn, high risks are to be taken. Here is the list of some great and famous personalities who took risk and invented things but died because of their inventions.
1. Marie Curie
She was a French chemist and physicist. She is well known for the discovery of new elements such as radium and polonium. She also gave the theory of radioactivity as well as the isolation of radioactive isotopes. She was a Nobel Prize winner for her inventions. But due to the exposure to radiations, she died from aplastic anaemia on 4th July, 1934.
2. Thomas Midgley
He is known for inventing petrol and CFCs. He was a chemist and eventually got lead poisoning. This made him disabled and he got inspired to create a pulley system using ropes so that he could lift himself up from the bed. But one day, at the age of 55, he got strangled into one of the ropes of his pulley and he died.
3. John Godfrey Parry-Thomas
J.G. Parry Thomas was an engineer and a motor racing driver who was a Welsh. He invented a high speed car gaining inspiration from his dream of crossing the land speed and records earlier set. He named his car as ‘Babs’ and it has very unique. It can be stated as there were chains used to connect wheels to the engine and those chains were not hidden but could be seen. He wanted to break the record of Malcolm Campbell and was successful once. But Malcolm made another record. While he was trying to reclaim the record, a chain snapped which hit his neck and killed him on the spot.
4. William Bullock
William bullock was born in America and is known for inventing rotatory press for printing in the year 1863. The print industry was all of a sudden revolutionized by the new rotating press which had great speed and perfect efficiency. One day, when he was repairing one of the press machines, his foot was crushed under it. He was actually trying to place a pulley into the right spot but instead hurt himself. Doctors tried to amputate his foot but he died during the operation.
5. Otto Lilienthal
Otto Lilienthal, later known as ‘The Glider King’, was a pioneer of aviation for humans. He was the first one in the history of mankind who was repeatedly successful in making gliding flights. He soon became famous throughout the world as newspapers and magazines started publishing photographs of him gliding. This influenced a lot of people about scientific opinions. People started believing that making a flying machine in reality was possible. This hope in people was after ages of fantasies and unscientific proofs. But on 9th august 1896, Otto Lilienthal took a flight and reached 17 meters above ground and then fell down. This accident broke his spine and he died next day.
6. Franz Reichelt
He was a tailor from Australia who is known for inventing a strange overcoat or parachute hybrid. Franz claimed that the one who wears this hybrid overcoat could sail gently to ground and even fly with it. For his experiments, he used the first and initial deck of Eiffel Tower, Paris. He then tried to conduct the flying experiment in front of a small crowd and a media crew with cameras. He immediately died from the impact of the fall.
7. Karel Soucek
He was a stuntman from Canada who is famous for his invention called “Capsule” which he used to ride down the Niagara Falls. The Capsule resembles a barrel and can be thought of as a modified barrel. While doing this, he suffered a few injuries but survived. In the year 1985, he got a company to finance his barrel drop from the height of Houston Astrodome, Texas, after a lot of convincing. They created a special waterfall at height of 18 ft from the ground with a pit at the bottom. Unfortunately, the stunt was unsuccessful and instead of falling in the center of the pool, he fell at the rim and injured himself severely. Next day itself, he died. To respect the invention, his ‘Capsule’ is a part of New York State Museum now.
8. Cowper Phipps Coles
Cowper Phipps Coles was a much respected Royal Navy Captain during the Crimean War. He invented a rotating turret that can be used in ships. When the war was over, he made that rotating turret his patent and started making his own ships using that design involving revolution. He made a ship named HMS Captain which needed many unusual modifications which were also dangerous. One of the modifications was to create a ‘Hurricane Deck’ that raised the center of gravity. This Hurricane Deck capsized on 6th September 1870 and the incident killed Cowper Coles and many others among its 500 crew members.
9. Alexander Bogdanov
Alexander Bogdanov was a physician, economist, philosopher, writer (science fiction) and a revolutionary. He was from Russia and was one of the many Great Russian scientists. He did many experiments and one of his ideas was of rejuvenation through transfusion of blood. In his experiments, he gave blood transfusions to many patients one of them was Lenin’s sister. Then, he made a decision that he would try it on himself. So he gave a transfusion of one patient’s blood. That patient whose blood was transfused was suffering from malaria and tuberculosis. Shortly, after that, Alexander died.
10. Henry Winstanley:
Henry Winstanley was a very famous English architect who used to build lighthouses. He was the one engineer who was behind the construction of first Eddystone Lighthouse. After building that lighthouse, he wanted to test the strength of the lighthouse in every kind of weather. He, therefore, went up inside the lighthouse during a storm. The lighthouse could not stand against the storm and collapsed. This killed Winstanley and other five people.
No time for spell checking huh ?