Stuff Doesn't Just Happen I: The Gift of Failure: Titanic, Kegworth, Custer, Schoolhouse, Donner, Tulips, Apollo 13 (Shit Doesn't Just Happen Book 1)

What can we learn from past disasters in order to prevent future ones?

Saying “stuff happens” indicates events are random, have no meaning and there is no accountability or responsibility. It indicates such events could just as easily happen again and there’s nothing we can do about them.

Bull.

This book is about catastrophes and how to avoid them, mitigate their effects and learn from them as seen from the perspective of the Masters of Chaos: United States Army Special Forces (Green Berets). Taking the attitude shit happens is negative and is fatal. In this book we learn why propane has a smell; how crash positions in airplanes were refined; how economic bubbles happen over and over; how failures in leadership lead to murder, cannibalism and massacre; and much more.

Titanic: Systematic Failure
Kegworth Plane Crash: The Danger of Deferring to Authority and Experts
Little Big Horn: Leadership Failure
New London Schoolhouse Explosion: Lack of Focus
The Donner Party: Social Disintegration
From Tulips to the Housing Bubble: Greed Overwhelms Reality
Apollo 13: Success Snatched from the Jaws of Catastrophe

The bottom line is we can predict and prevent most catastrophes because every one has at least one man made factor, of the 7 cascade events, involved. In other words, we have control over whether shit happens. But it means changing a complacent mindset, getting rid of delusional thinking, and viewing the world around us in a Green Beret way.

Because stuff doesn’t just happen.