A leaking flexible pipe started a fire in the Engine Room aboard the Carnival Triumph during its return journey from Mexico in early 2013. The fire caused minor damage in one, very important section of the Engine Room leading to a total loss of Mains Power. With only intermittent Emergency Power and over 4,000 people on board the ship drifted with the currents before it was tugged finally to safety. The Netflix Documentary 'Poop Cruise' looked at the human consequences...we dive into the engineering design that was inherently flawed from Day One.

After an extended outage of the Methomyl Unit at the Bayer facility in Institute, West Virginia, the decision was made to commence a restart of the Unit even though the DCS upgrade was still incomplete and the newly replaced Residue Treater hadn't been fully recommissioned. An incident whose root cause was years in the making would ultimately cost two people their lives.

In the early hours of the evening on the 17th of April, 2013 in the small city of West, Texas...smoke was seen emanating from the West Fertilizer Company building. In 20 minutes there was a massive explosion that levelled the facility and its surroundings, killing 15 people and injuring hundreds more. How this came to be, represented a failure of regulations, planning and grandfathering on every level.

On Valentines Day in 1981 in the North of Dublin, Ireland a fire broke out in a nightclub just following a Disco Dancing competition. We look at how measures taken to prevent illegal entry and poor building material choices cost 48 young people their lives.

On the 20th of September, 2022 at the BP Husky Toledo refinery in Ohio, a level transmitter change out from a month prior triggered a chain of events that would cost two operators their lives. We look at how poor Management of Change, high alarm rates and a resistance to stopping the job, let a plant upset turn into a disaster.

On Friday the 19th of July, 2024 millions of CrowdStrike Falcon Agents the world over would lead to a Windows system crash on business machines throwing parts of the world into chaos. We look into exactly what caused it and how complacency and a lack of understanding amplified the effect of this wholly preventable incident.

In 2017 during an Odoriser decontamination procedure in West Virginia, two people were killed when it unexpectedly exploded. Barely a month later, a similar procedure at the same site led to a second explosion, killing someone else. We examine how poor hazard analysis and legal interference led to yet another fatality...right in front of the eyes of the investigators on site.

In 2021 the Callide C Power Station experienced a unit failure that tore the turbine-generator apart, resulted in hundreds of thousands of premises losing power, and cost hundreds of millions to repair. We look at how design errors and ultimately a lack of information led to the incident escalating out of control, when it could have been recovered.

In 2021 many of Colonial Pipelines IT systems were locked by malware and out of caution they shutdown the fuel pipelines feeding nearly half of the Eastern US leading to chaos at the gas pump and a state of emergency being declared. We look at how poor off-boarding hygiene led to an easily preventable cyber-attack.

The I35W bridge over the Mississippi River carried 140,000 cars every day. Inspections in 1999 and 2003 showed damage to support plates that was dismissed as unimportant at the time. We look into how poor design checking and assumptions led to the bridge collapsing in 2007, costing the lives of 13 people.

Five months after Lion Air 610 crashed, another 737-MAX went down with a similar cause. However the official report was at odds with two other internationally respected investigative organisations. We dig into the detail of how the AOA Sensor was claimed to have failed, and review checklist discrepancies to extract fact from opinion as to what most likely triggered this horrible chain of events.

A fireworks company in Western Australia that had been in business for nearly a century, were preparing for a fireworks display in their packing shed when one ignited and set off a fire and an explosion. Onlookers were shocked when there was a subsequent explosion that was so big it was heard 30 kilometers away leaving the facility in ruins.

When a radiation therapy machine was left behind during a move between buildings in central Brazil, it set in motion a series of events that would lead to one of the worst radiological incidents in history. We look into how bureaucracy and misdiagnosis cost four people their lives and how the actions of a concerned mother with no medical experience, saved the lives of countless more.

The tallest building in Missouri with a large atrium perfect for big bands and dancing, hosted a regular Tea Dance in the summer of 1981. When two walkways collapsed killing over a hundred people, the investigators found multiple fundamental design errors. We look at how assumptions, redrafting conventions and negligence led to an incident that has become the case study in how not to do civil structural design.

The longest, tallest, fastest indoor rollercoaster in the world was only open six months when the last carriage of a train came loose, killing three people and all that the day following an inspection that the ride was safe to operate. We look at how a design choice made maintenance more critical and then how wishing for a ride to be safe, doesn't really help.

In 1977, a commuter train from the Blue Mountains, destined for Sydney central station would derail just before Granville Station, causing a bridge to collapse and crush many aboard. It remains Australia's worst ever rail disaster that was predicted by 11 engineering department heads just a year earlier. We look at how management decisions led to a completely avoidable disaster.

In Beirut in August of 2020, an explosion at the Port of Beirut destroyed a huge part of the city. We look into how an oxidising agent, improperly handled can become an explosive and attempt to comprehend how something so dangerous was ignored repeatedly by key people, despite many warnings of an imminent disaster.

In 1911 in Manhattan, New York, a clothing factory went up in flames just before closing time. We look at how faulty equipment, poor design and a fear of theft contributed to a wholly preventable incident that had such terrible consequences, but would trigger reforms that still impact the United States, a century later.

The original Royal Canberra Hospital was flagged to be demolished in 1997 to make way for the new National Museum. A demolition via implosion was selected, but the implosion resulted in an explosion instead, and debris showered the huge crowd of onlookers with fatal consequences.

The university wanted a bridge for its students over a busy roadway that would appear intriguing from afar. Instead it collapsed before it was even finished. We look into how design errors, poor peer review and denial led to a collapse that claimed six peoples lives.