On July 17, 1944, at 10:18 PM, four thousand six hundred tons of munitions being loaded onto the Quinault Victory detonated, the force of the explosions lifted it out of the water making it land five hundred feet away from where it was.
The Port Chicago disaster was a deadly munitions explosion that occurred on July 17, 1944, at the Port Chicago Naval Magazine in Port Chicago, California, United States. At 10:18 p.m., witnesses reported hearing a noise described as "a metallic sound and rending timbers, such as made by a falling boom." Immediately afterward, an explosion occurred on the pier and a fire started. Five to seven seconds later a more powerful explosion took place as the majority of the ordnance within and near the SS E. A. Bryan detonated in a fireball seen for miles. At 10 p.m. on July 17, Division Three's 98 men were loading E. A. Bryan with 1,000-pound (450 kg) bombs into No. One hundred and two men of the Sixth Division, many fresh from training at NSGL, were busy rigging the newly built Victory ship SS Quinault Victory (also spelled Quinalt) in preparation for loading it with explosives, a task that was to begin at midnight. After four days of around-the-clock loading, about 4,600 tons (4,173 tonnes) of explosives had been stored in its holds. The E. A. Bryan was completely destroyed and the Quinault was blown out of the water, torn into sections and thrown in several directions; the stern landed upside down in the water 500 ft (150 m) away. 
