Check out Karl's Socials: Fact Fiend: www.youtube.com/ @FactFiend Wiki Weekends: www.youtube.com/ @wikiweekends Untitled Side Channel: www.youtube.com/ @untitledsidechannel Twitter: / karlsmallwood Ben Adelman can be reached for comments or commissions at badel811@gmail.com.

@jessgunn6639

2 ай бұрын

the english chunnel diggers were buried, the french dismanteled theirs and removed them, one is still on display on the french side

Been through the Blanc many times as a former Continental Truck driver. It’s a long one but the scenery in the Aosta valley is worth it

@geographicstravel

2 ай бұрын

I'd be totally claustrophobic inside it. I'm not afraid of enclosed spaces normally either, but something about driving through a tunnel with the entire weight of a mountain sitting on top of me makes my subconscious go crazy.

@Iamtheliquor

2 ай бұрын

@@geographicstravel lol! It was more the length of it. They’re really strict on lorries maintaining the correct distance apart by using blue lights on the side of the tunnel walls and speed limits too

Great video, Karl. Enjoyed the tangents and those little factoids that you are well aware of. Get well soon!!

6:53 Pfft, I don't have to wait for the Mad Max-like post-apocalyptic world to start worshipping the mechanical tunneling worm, thank you very much. Great work as ever, Karl. Glad you got to treat a (mostly) positive subject.

' if Hannibal had the option he'd have taken his elephants through the tunnel instead of over the Alps ' .... yeah Karl that would be some sight .. lol

@888johnmac

2 ай бұрын

oh and get well soon Karl

Karl goes full on brainblaze in the intro

Nice, new video! And as much as I like Simon, it's really refreshing to have some channels with more hosts, while grtting the same quality thanks to your guys great writing team

Thanks For this karl! Love your content 🔥🔥🔥

That Keeps stuff really helped Simon, huh?

@lulujanuary

2 ай бұрын

😂

I don’t completely understand why the truck driver was fined if the cause of the fire was someone else throwing a cigarette butt out the window. Was it because he stopped in the tunnel? How would he have known that stopping to get his extinguisher would make things worse?

@threems172

2 ай бұрын

I had the same question so did some digging. Can't find anything he did wrong. Looks to me like it was such a disaster that it became political and they needed to make it look like some people had paid for it. I wonder if the driver got convicted just because he had survived where others had died. Not much he could have done. Only got a 4 month suspended sentence though

@mattyt1961

2 ай бұрын

To add to @threems172, it seems that everyone except Volvo (manufacturer) was found guilty of something. Depending on the source, some say he "fled" after getting out of the truck and seeing it was on fire. If that is true (or it was perceived that way) he might have been charged for failing to assist or warn or something like that. Not saying that is right, but it is the only thing I can come up with without reading the court transcripts, and I am not going to do that :D

I hope you feel better, soon ,Karl 🫶 I also hope you become one of the permanent hosts of this channel. I love your episodes.

Things had to go wrong perfectly, to make things go so perfectly wrong.

Im confident a large number of people will have heard of this tunnel.

@lulujanuary

2 ай бұрын

😂

@FatManWalking18

2 ай бұрын

on Top Gear, Jezza took the Veyron through the tunnel with a truffle as the cargo

I loved Mont Blanc as Joey in the Friends TV show

Looks like Karl is drinking Mountain Dew

@StupidCatLady

2 ай бұрын

The best medicine obviously

@888johnmac

2 ай бұрын

lol , as he's Bittish i guess it's green tea ( possibly with Honey )

@StupidCatLady

2 ай бұрын

@@888johnmac Most likely, but the idea of Mountain Dew is humorous

@goosenotmaverick1156

2 ай бұрын

​@@888johnmacthat's the greenest green tea I've ever seen. There's no way that's not an artificial color. It's likely a product like "airborne" immune booster.

@goosenotmaverick1156

2 ай бұрын

It's that or a Theraflu type medicine product.

Daylight - great movie. good reporting, thanks ks. margarine is 1 molecule away from plastic - even bugs won't eat it.

Shout out to Chuggy. Buried, but never forgotten 😅

Not to be confused with the Mel Blanc Tunnel, which is just painted onto the side of a cliff.

@mattyt1961

2 ай бұрын

🤣 splat

Thank you.

I have driven through it because my uncles live in the opposite sides of Mont Blanc (France and Italy) sometimes you forget you are in a tunnel until you see light

Clearly entertaining! Hope you get well soon, from across the pond. Austin,TX

Sore throat advice: skip the noxious dayglo liquid and just have some brandy. A few sips will fix anything wrong in there.

Drove through this last month in an Audi q8 which threw the brakes on hard as we crossed the Italian border in the middle of the tunnel along with the message that predictive cruise control is not available in Italy. I can probably understand why... You can't predict Italian driving! Still... Thankful for the 150m gap enforcement

I'm one of the few that didn't know about this tunnel, so I enjoyed learning about its history. I'm not surprised the fire in '99 reached the level it did in a tunnel that long, but that there were supposed to be safety measures in place to prevent a disaster like that from happening and they weren't working like they were supposed to enrages me. The loss of life breaks my heart. I don't see how the truck driver was at fault for what happened, but, as another commenter said, the officials probably wanted/needed a scapegoat to focus the public outrage on.

One key aspect of more modern surveying accuracy is the application of lasers. Either as electro-mechanical and/or visual reference guides.

@hoppytoad79

2 ай бұрын

I'm curious how that works. Do you know?

2:35 - Chapter 1 - Conquering the alps 4:55 - Chapter 2 - Drill, baby, drill ! 9:15 - Chapter 3 - An indispensable artery 11:40 - Chapter 4 - Disaster 16:40 - Chapter 5 - Aftermath 19:30 - Chapter 6 - Keep on truckin' 23:05 - Conclusion

It's kinda hard to not know about this when in Italy there's a documentary that talks about the tragedy, plus when the anniversary occurs they remember Spadino : the man who saved 10 people before ultimately dying in one of the fire shelters with another trucker

@hoppytoad79

2 ай бұрын

The man's a hero, but I'm sure he'd say he was just doing his job. I have so much respect for firefighters.

@Anniiee_s

2 ай бұрын

@@hoppytoad79 He wasn't a firefighter, he was a supervisor if I'm correct - the actual (French) firefighters basically went to their death sadly, there were problems at the department back then if i remember correctly

@hoppytoad79

2 ай бұрын

@@Anniiee_s They're all heros.

Good luck if you're trying to hold your breath when traveling through this particular tunnel

Just a small detail: "Midi" in French means midday, but it also has an older and rarer meaning where it translates as "South". In that case, "Aiguille du Midi" translates as "Need of the South" ;)

Heard about. Went through it on a motorbike. Got the tee-shirt. Why would you think most would not have heard of it?

Something like the Spiral Tunnels is also an engineering marvel, but Canadian based videos tend to not do well on any of the whistler channels.

Pretty much everyone in Europe (at the very least, western and central Europe) will have heard of the Mont Blanc Tunnel! ;)

Where did Simon go? Coming back to the channel after a few months and now it's this guy?

Whenabouts you are in the world also.

I'll be honest I first heard about the fire when Jeremy Clarkson mentioned it during a Top Gear race

11:59 Hey, we had that video too, before I saw any of the Rocky or Rambo movies. I probably didn't watch it as much as you, though.

I watch a documentary about the tunnel fire, I remember its called Zero Hour.

This guy belongs in 28 days later

You didnt mention Nolan. How cpuld you forget him?

Wow the views really went down when simom left

Heard of it ? Used it . And the much longer Gotthard Tunnel in Switzerland

Margarine main ingredient is vegetable oil, oil burns.

Dude, you cant say that we probely havent heard of this tunnel. The fire was all over the news in europa.

No disrespect to Simon, but it is nice to have a different host and you are acing it! I actually prefer watching videos with you as host

Woo more Karl!!!

Just a matter of time.. A fatalistic lot are we not..

@hoppytoad79

2 ай бұрын

Especially in the U.S., where infrastructure is complete shite these days. XP

Can we give Karl a fricken sick dat ffs. The man looks like hes staring in 28 Years Later

You should do a video on another engineering marvel that no will have heard off ... it's a big railway bridge in Scotland, I think it's called the Forth Bridge 🤣

0:54

Antifreeze heals anything 🤔

I would prefer greater emphasis on the planning and engineering of the tunnel, the political concessions, etc. It felt like so much of the video was banter and discussing the accident instead of the creation\achievement .

nice wiglett

what happened to fact boy?

@kennylynch9317

2 ай бұрын

He's busy AF, he's creating a network like a good fact boy should.

@goosenotmaverick1156

2 ай бұрын

Oh. My. God. Every. Video. 😂😂😂

@goosenotmaverick1156

2 ай бұрын

He's legit been gone for MONTHS. 😂

Jokes on you, i'm french.

Paid over 400 euro to tow a boat on the back of a jeep through there few years ago. Will take the long way next time

Who tf is this dude and why is simon whistler not doing any of these anymore?

@Hillbilly001

2 ай бұрын

Simon parted ways with this channel Biographics and Top10z about a year ago or so. Time to come into the present.

@archstanton6102

2 ай бұрын

Didn't you notice no simon whisler on the previous videos?

"a tunnel you likely never heard of"........... 🤦

You're not Simon!

@geographicstravel

2 ай бұрын

Wow, I didn't notice! Good eye!

Thanks for a video containing sh1t about the tunnel, all about you! Gen z: Me, Me, only MEEE

This would be a good watch if your intination wasn't so annoying.

1st

No, it's not the tallest mountain in Europe. It's not even in the top five

another morning, another simon video where I see some kid who isn't simon and click away asap

@Hillbilly001

2 ай бұрын

Oh, get over it. Simon ain't ever coming back. He's got other things to do. Besides, Karl tangents a lot more than Simon did on this channel and Biographics. Counting Top10z too. Move on.

@resileaf9501

2 ай бұрын

Imagine going on a channel not owned by Simon and being angry that Simon isn't there. Grow up.

@Hillbilly001

2 ай бұрын

@@resileaf9501 Well said. Well said indeed. Cheers

@bradlevantis913

2 ай бұрын

If you check his previous comments all he does is complain about the new host. Just a small man who feels better complaining about someone else

@Hillbilly001

2 ай бұрын

@@bradlevantis913 Ahhh! A troll. Gotcha. Cheers

it's sad that the Union hasn't happened. You have no sick pay and are getting coffee for Simon. You can tell how cheap he is by the clothes he wears. Same suit jacket for a few years now. At least he's stopped belching on screen.

I am sorry your parents didn't love you enough to give you a better name

Imagine paying over $50 to use a tunnel. Do Euro-peons really?? 😂😂

Karl has all the charisma of a fart in a lift. I'm not watching.

@Hillbilly001

2 ай бұрын

Good. Don't let the door hit you in the ass when you leave.

@man_without_fear6518

2 ай бұрын

@@Hillbilly001 simp

@hoppytoad79

2 ай бұрын

So don't. No one cares.

Lame version of the channel

Just wanted to mention: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierlucio_Tinazzi

Valle d'Aosta 🖤🖤🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹🟥◼️

Note. Everyone on the planet knows of it... Especially as Simon has already covered it on this channel.