Seconds from Disaster is an American documentary television series that first broadcasted in 2004 on the National Geographic Channel. The program investigates historically relevant man-made and natural disasters. Each episode aims to explain a single incident by analyzing the causes and circumstances that ultimately affected the disaster. The series uses re-enactments, interviews, testimonies, and CGI to analyze the sequence of events second-by-second for the audience.
Seconds from Disaster was broadcast on the National Geographic Channel and originally consisted of 45 episodes over three seasons. Following its original conclusion in 2007, the series was put in hiatus and promptly replaced with Critical Situation. In 2011, National Geographic revived the series, announcing it would air a new season from September 5, 2011. It began with an episode about the September 11 attacks.
Narrators for the show are Ashton Smith (American narrator for seasons 1 to 3), Richard Vaughan (British narrator for seasons 1,2 and first 6 episodes of season 3; narrator from season 4 onwards) and Peter Guinness (British narrator for last 13 episodes of season 3).
Famous quotes containing the words seconds and/or disaster:
“Watching fifteen seconds of nasal passages unblocking sure beats watching thirty seconds.”
—Barbara Lippert, U.S. advertising critic. As quoted in Newsweek magazine, p. 8 (June 16, 1986)
“When disaster waves, I try not to wave back.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)