Video | Downtown Disasters | Chicago Stories

Chicago Stories recalls two very different disasters that occurred in the heart of Chicago’s Loop 90 years apart: First, the deadliest building fire in U.S. history: the 1903 Iroquois Theatre Fire. Then, the Great Loop Flood of 1992: a $2 billion disaster. As downtown buildings mysteriously flooded with water from the Chicago River, the city searched for answers in a long-forgotten tunnel system.

Why does Chicago have a freight tunnel system? Explore the strange tunnels that played a big role in the 1992 Loop flood.

The Iroquois Theater was a brand-new, opulent theater considered to be "absolutely fireproof" and designed to boost Chicago’s reputation as a world-class city.

In the wake of the Iroquois Theater Fire, the city, theaters, builders, and other groups involved learned painful lessons about fire safety.

The man in charge of fixing the Loop flood, John Kenny, earns a strange nickname from the press and becomes a local celebrity.