Dec 9, 2013 2 min read

Edward Lorenz, a meteorologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, helped popularize the notion of the “butterfly effect,” which posits that major, cataclysmic events could have roots in the most trifling, everyday occurrences. Lorenz suggested, for instance, that a hurricane’s origin could lie in the simple flapping of a butterfly’s wings.

Residents around Washington learned a thing or two about the butterfly effect last Thursday afternoon and evening. Traffic came to a halt in the eastbound lanes on Interstate 70, and the city and surrounding townships experienced Manhattan-worthy levels of gridlock, due to a tanker truck that went over sideways on the highway.

The driver said the mishap was sparked by a sneeze and a brief blackout.

That one sneeze, the most routine of bodily responses to dust and other forms of nasal irritation, had a considerable ripple effect. Time and productivity were lost as people struggled to get to work or home, gasoline burned away as vehicles moved forward in millimeter increments and blood pressure ticked relentlessly upward. There was also the cost of clearing the accident scene, as gallons of corn syrup leaked from the tanker. Hundreds of people were affected.

And it all started with a sneeze.

Perhaps the most famous of all sneezes happened in 1894 when a sternutation by Thomas Edison assistant Fred Ott was captured for the five-second short film, “Fred Ott’s Sneeze,” which became the first motion picture to receive a copyright in the United States. While last Thursday’s sneeze will not have as long a life as Fred Ott’s, in the Washington area it proved to be quite memorable.