In the 1840s, Victorian engineering mastermind Isambard Kingdom Brunel set out to solve a major problem: heavy steam locomotives struggled with the steep inclines of Devon, England. His futuristic solution was the South Devon Railway, an atmospheric system that abandoned traditional onboard steam engines entirely. Instead, trains were pulled by a piston traveling inside a continuous iron pipe laid between the tracks.
Stationary pumping stations situated every few miles pumped air out of the pipe, creating a vacuum in front of the train and allowing normal atmospheric pressure to push it along at remarkable speeds of up to 60 miles per hour. The fatal flaw lay in the pipe's top seam, which had to open to allow the train's connecting arm to pass through while maintaining an airtight seal. Brunel used a continuous flap of thick leather sealed with a mixture of tallow and beeswax.
While the system worked smoothly during initial trials, real-world conditions quickly ruined the grand experiment. Salt air from the Devon coast caused the iron hinges to rust, extreme weather dried out and froze the leather, and worst of all, the animal fat grease attracted thousands of hungry local rats. The rodents systematically devoured the leather seals, rendering the pipe incapable of holding a vacuum.
Desperate maintenance crews tried replacing and re-greasing the leather, but costs skyrocketed. By September 1848, after less than a year of operation, the atmospheric railway was abandoned at a massive financial loss, proving that even the grandest engineering marvels can be defeated by hungry vermin.