The Deadliest Machine at Hoover Dam Was a Steel Cable - 1931

Video Description

Every 78 seconds, a 20-ton concrete bucket swung across Black Canyon on a steel cable. The men below had nowhere to run. At least 13 workers were killed by the cableway system alone. Support and buy us a coffee: http://www.buymeacoffee.com/ConstructionLegends This is the untold equipment story of Hoover Dam. Ten aerial cableways, eight custom-built drilling jumbos, the largest dump trucks ever made, 500 Ingersoll-Rand pneumatic drills, and twelve Caterpillar Sixty tractors converged on Black Canyon between 1931 and 1936 to build the tallest dam in the world. We walk through seven phases of construction and cover every major machine that made the dam possible, from the $172,000 Lidgerwood cableway (still operational after 90+ years) to the Mack AP dump trucks with chain-driven rear wheels (only 2 survive today), to Bernard "Woody" Williams' drilling jumbo built from a junked 1916 International Harvester truck. We also cover the deaths the company tried to hide. 42 tunnel workers killed by carbon monoxide poisoning, officially recorded as "pneumonia." 16 men dead from heat in a single month. And the father and son who drowned on the exact same date, 13 years apart. Construction Legends produces in-depth documentaries about heavy equipment history, industrial engineering, and the people behind the machines that built the modern world. ⏱️ Timestamps 00:00 The cableway that killed 13 men 06:24 Moving the Colorado River 13:02 Stripping the canyon walls 17:35 The deadliest machines on the project 23:10 Concrete and ice 29:16 The men who never came home 33:08 What the machines left behind Sources and further reading: Bureau of Reclamation — Hoover Dam History: usbr.gov/history/hoover.html Bureau of Reclamation — Fatality Records: usbr.gov/lc/hooverdam/history/essays/fatal.html Fortune Magazine (1933) — Field Reports: usbr.gov/lc/hooverdam/history/articles/fortune1933f.html Missouri S&T — Rogers, Hoover Dam Part 3: web.mst.edu/rogersda/hoover_dam/Rogers-HooverDam-Pt3.pdf UNLV Special Collections — Oral Histories: special.library.unlv.edu/collections/hoover-dam Dunar & McBride — "Building Hoover Dam: An Oral History of the Great Depression" (1993) This video is for educational and documentary purposes. All footage is used under Fair Use (17 U.S.C. § 107) for commentary, criticism, and historical documentation. No copyright infringement intended. Subscribe for more construction equipment history and industrial documentaries: youtube.com/@ConstructionLegends?sub_confirmation=1 #HooverDam #ConstructionHistory #HeavyEquipment #EngineeringHistory #Caterpillar #DamConstruction #ConstructionLegends --- Contact: [email protected] © Construction Legends 2026