Abstract for "When Things Break"

Tacoma Narrows Bridge

Abstract

This course is about what happens when things break. When something breaks, engineers are called upon to ask themselves, and answer: What caused it? Could it have been prevented? What do we do now? And of course, who's responsible?

For my part, having been trained as an engineer myself, I could never bring myself to blame engineers, or the profession as a whole, for whatever mistakes we may have made over the years, no matter what damage may have been caused in a failure.

I use this information to remind engineers, and especially students, of the consequences of carelessness, of avoiding checks and doublechecks, of not including safety factors, of not budgeting for maintenance, and other such precautions. We have these things to use as tools because, as smart as we are, we simply aren't smart enough to keep the things we make from breaking.

Engineer, do you want to do good in the world? Then remember Samuel Florman's words:

The conscientious, effective engineer is a virtuous engineer.

For purposes of this course, an engineered system fails when it stops working. (Usually this means it broke, or broke down, or shut down.) A "failure" should not be mistaken for a "malfunction," in which case the system may work properly next time you turn it on. (In the case of structures, however, it's pretty difficult to mistake the two.) As far as malfunctions are concerned, though, one should also recognize that "malfunction" + "loss of opportunity" = "failure" even if the system does work properly next time it's used. (I might add that “loss of opportunity” is an emotion-free way of saying “loss of opportunity, loss of property, injury, and/or loss of life.”) So this is the working definition we use here:

failure (n) – malfunction plus loss of opportunity

The text that accompanies this course is When Things Break, edited by Ron Graham. This is a PDF, and you can receive it via e-mail during the first break in the course.

Contents

Definitions of terms

Examples of classic failures

Tacoma Narrows Bridge
Apollo 13
Union Carbide Bhopal
Others (if time permits)

Lessons learned

Design
Operation
Management
Maintenance
Materials & Parts
Production

Sources

Note: most of these sources were gathered within the first few years after this book was first organized. This is to say that there are few entries on this list dated long after 2000. Despite the classic nature of the information in the texts listed here, I welcome suggestions for new texts – and I read them. Please feel free to make suggestions.

Casey, Set Phasers on Stun
Florman, The Civilized Engineer
Florman, The Existential Pleasures of Engineering
Jones, Engineering Materials 3: Materials Failure Analysis – Case Studies and Design Implications
Kepner, The New Rational Manager
Kletz, What Went Wrong?
Kletz, An Engineer's View of Human Error
Kletz, Learning From Accidents
LaPierre and Moro, Five Past Midnight in Bhopal
Levy and Salvadori, Why Buildings Fall Down
Lovell and Kluger, Apollo 13
Murray and Cox, Apollo: The Race to the Moon
Nishida, Failure Analysis in Engineering Applications
Peterson, Fatal Defect: Chasing Killer Computer Bugs
Petroski, To Engineer is Human
Petroski, Design Paradigms: Case Histories of Error and Judgment in Engineering
Rogers et. al. "Report to the President by the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident." Washington DC, June 1986.
Vaughan, The Challenger Launch Decision
Witherell, Mechanical Failure Avoidance

Contact

Dr. Ron Graham is Principal of Clarity Strategic, based in the Akron, OH area.

Clarity provides among its services the following:

Social media presence, marketing, and integration with company Web site
Documentation of products, services, and processes
Development of e-books and other media for sale or public relations
Prototyping of new products and services
Development of staff, especially new employees and engineers / technical staff

Here’s how you reach Ron:

phone 330.294.8000
e-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Facebook http://facebook.com/ron.graham
LinkedIn http://linkedin.com/in/rongraham
Twitter http://twitter.com/rongraham1

You might like Ron's other engineering-related courses:

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