lightning struck 3,000 to 6,000 hundredweight (roughly 150-300 tonnes) of gunpowder stored by the Ottoman Empire in the bell tower of the Agios Ioannis church near the Palace of the Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes in Rhodes, triggering a blast that destroyed large parts of the city and killed 4,000 people. The Battle of the Crater during the siege of Petersburg, Virginia During the American Civil War at 4:44 a.m. on July 30, 1864, the Union Army of the Potomac besieging the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia at Petersburg, Virginia detonated a mine containing 320 kegs of gunpowder, totalling 8,000 pounds (3,600 kg) under the Confederate entrenchments. The explosion killed 278 Confederate soldiers of the 18th and 22nd South Carolina regiments and created a crater 170 feet (52 m) long, 100 to 120 feet (30 to 37 m) wide, and at least 30 feet (9 m) deep. After the explosion, attacking Union forces charged into the crater instead of around its lip. Trapped in the crater of their own making, the Union forces were easy targets for the Confederate soldiers once they recovered from the shock of the explosion. Union forces suffered 3798 casualties (killed, wounded, or captured) vs 1491 total losses for the Confederates. The Union forces failed to break through the Confederate defences despite the success of the mine. The Battle of the Crater (as it came to be called) was thus a victory for the Confederacy. However, the siege continued. Fort Fisher Magazine explosion In 1865 after the Union Army captured Fort Fisher, North Carolina, the accidental explosion of the fort magazine resulted in an estimated 200 deaths. Mobile magazine explosion On 25 May 1865, in Mobile, Alabama, in the United States, an ordnance depot (magazine) exploded, killing 300 people. This event occurred six weeks after the end of the American Civil War, during the occupation of the city by victorious Federal troops. Flood Rock explosion On 10 October 1885 in New York City, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers detonated 300,000 pounds (150 t) of explosives on Flood Rock, annihilating the island, in order to clear the Hell Gate tidal strait for the benefit of East River shipping traffic. The explosion sent a geyser of water in the air; the blast was felt as far away as Princeton, New Jersey. The explosion has been described as "the largest planned explosion before testing began for