Last week, an explosion beneath a street near Grand Central Terminal in midtown Manhattan sent a giant stream of scalding, brownish steam up through the street and into the sky. The explosion caused a large crater, roughly 35-40 feet wide, and was so strong that it flipped over a tow truck. The cloud of steam and hail of debris from the explosion lasted more than two hours and raised concerns of asbestos contamination. The cause of the blast? Not as some rushed to assert, a terrorist attack, but an underground steam pipe constructed in 1924 that exploded when too much cold rain water leaked on it. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg acknowledged this when he stated, "There is no reason to believe this is anything other than a failure of our infrastructure."