Every single story the Tab Manchester broke that went national

Fallowfield house party floor collapse

This story, broken all the way back in the good old days of 2014, reports of “pandemonium” after the ground floor of a student house on Amherst Road literally collapsed into the basement below, leaving a “huge crater” full of partygoers.

Paramedics and fire services were called to the scene, but luckily no one was seriously hurt. Some (experts) say that it was due to rotting timbers in the foundations of the house, others (legends) say that’s just how hard we party in Manchester.

This story was picked up by BBC News and the Daily Mail who took their own spin on it – laying the blame entirely with the students, and their “combined weight”. In true DM fashion, some hilarious comments ensued, with one clearly very informed person linking the collapse of the floor to fixed university exams. Right.

 

World’s hottest chilli nightmare on Mauldeth Road

This hilarious story from halloween 2015 was major news at the time.

Four second year houses had to be industrially fumigated, and the fire brigade were called to Mauldeth Road after the fumes from someone cooking up hot chills seeped into the walls during pre drinks. The toxic chill fumes caused the unsuspecting residents violent coughing fits, itchy eyes and in on case, vomiting. The residents, unsure what was happening headed outside to call the emergency services over what they assumed was a gas leak.

The story was picked up by and re-reported in the Mirror, the Daily Mail, the Daily Star, the Express and The Sun who dubbed the incident “Silly Chillies”.

Brian Cox got the E=mc2 equation wrong

Brian Cox, arguably the University of Manchester’s greatest export (besides The Tab), supposedly wrote up the famous equation wrong whilst speaking in a first year lecture. Cox, initially refused to believe he was wrong when corrected by one of the freshers, eventually realising his mistake ensuing hilarity in the lecture theatre.

This story, which was another corker from 2015, went absolutely huge. It was read over 36,000 times and took over Yik Yak. Some drama was also caused when a student uploaded a podcast of the lecture, which apparently was a copyright infringement.

There was a lot of controversy that followed, where attendants of the lecture battled it out in the comments over whether it was in fact the famous equation, on which Cox has written a book, or a different, but equally confusing equation.

Either way, Brian Cox was still corrected by a first year.

Sexual assault in Fallowfield

The team at The Tab Manchester have worked tirelessly to keep the issue of sexual assault in Fallowfield in the news. We recognise that it’s a serious issue that sadly not enough has been done about. While Fallowfield’s house parties have been debated in parliament, the epidemic of sexual assault in our student area is largely unadressed. We’ve written several articles that have raked in tens of thousands of views between them, most notably our sexual assault map and Why do you care when we’re having house parties, but not when we’re being raped?

Sexism during the olympics

This brilliant feature, documenting every sexist moment from Rio 2016 was viewed over 80,000 times. It listed everything from derogatory comments about gymnast’s outfits to male coaches being credited for female athlete’s wins. The piece, written by one of our very own Manchester writers was published on The Tab’s women’s site, Babe (the fastest growing women’s site in the world), starting something of a trend. In the following days we saw similar lists appearing in Harper’s Bazaar, the Huffington Post, The Telegraph and countless others.

Being honest on Tinder

This article was something of a social experiment, exploring what happens when you give your Tinder (or any dating profile) a totally honest makeover, complete with hungover pictures in your bra munching McDonalds. The story was picked up last month by BBC Radio 1’s The Surgery , in which they invited our editor on the show to talk about honesty, and how she fared with the profile makeover.

Warehouse Project’s Bollywood night controversy

We broke this story after the backlash that followed the release of Warehouse Project’s Bollywood night poster. The poster pictured an image of Hindu deity, Shiva partying and in fancy dress with a cigarette in one of his many hands.

Warehouse Project were quick to respond, quickly changing the image and issuing an apology, but not before the story was shared nationally in Vice and the Daily Mail.

Decapitated Margaret Thatcher cutout

This story was broken after “revolutionary socialists” at the fresher’s fair DECAPITATED a cardboard cutout, presumably to make some sort of point. Or to just be uni legends.

Regardless of intention, this story of crazy lefty students made it into the Mirror. Viva la revolution!

Yolandi the Tarantula’s epic Oak House adventure

If you don’t remember that time when there was a tarantula found in a bathroom in Oak House then you seriously must have been living under a rock. We reported this as it happened, with a play-by-play of Yolandi the Tarantula’s every move right up until she was safely reunited with her owner.

The unusual story, of course, intrigued everyone. It was picked up by the Daily Mail, The Sun, the Huffington Post, the Daily Express, the Metro and the Mirror.

Manchester SU’s introduction of working class officers

Admittedly this story originally covered in The Times, however it only really picked up momentum after The Tab put their spin on it.

It caused quite a stir, being covered by the Telegraph and with The Sun dubbing us “generation snowflake”. Sigh.

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