Workers Ventured Deep Beneath London’s Streets To Battle A Foul Mass The Weight Of A Cottage

As pedestrians bustle through the streets of England’s capital city, way down below a team of engineers are preparing to do battle. Armed only with basic equipment, they descend into the sewers of East London, ready to tackle a fearsome foe. The size of a one-story house, this enemy is a gruesome ticking time bomb of epic proportions.

For weeks, the team worked in horrific surroundings under the ground, struggling with cramped spaces and terrible smells. But eventually, they began to win the war. So what was this disgusting monster lurking beneath London? And how did it make its way into the sewers of this sprawling city?

After all, London has a rich and varied history, with plenty of sinister secrets lurking in the depths of its past. Was one of these finally uncovered when engineers from Thames Water ventured into the network of tunnels beneath the capital’s streets? Or was there another grim relic lodged in the city’s underbelly?

The history of London’s sewer system stretches back to the middle of the 1800s, when cholera outbreaks were devastating the city. After thousands had died, the link between the infection and poor urban hygiene became difficult to ignore. And so, an engineer named Joseph Bazalgette was commissioned to design a solution.

What Bazalgette came up with in the end was certainly impressive. Come the mid-1860s vast swathes of the city had been connected to a sprawling system of underground sewers, conducting waste through tunnels towards processing facilities. And as time has passed, the network’s grown even more extensive and complex.