Decision Quality Blog

WABC reports that the candidate "cause" of the horrible crane collapse in New York City was a $50 bit of nylon webbing.

That nylon webbing was found still attached to the collar and it could mean this deadly, multi-million dollar disaster was set-off by a crucial piece of equipment that cost just $50.

A preliminary investigation found that the crane toppled when a steel collar used to tie the crane to the side of the building fell as workers attempted to install it, damaging a lower steel collar that supported the crane. With the elimination of that support, the counter-weights at the top of the crane’s tower caused it to fall, investigators said.

That’s just too sad and weird to even think about. In the end, the investigation will tell a more nuanced story of a series of seemingly unrelated decisions, missed bits of information, and unheeded warnings that added up to this leading to that leading to this and over the crane went. It’s always the weakest link that does in any complex system.

When we work with clients on complex decision, the question that needs to be asked relates to the notion of creating a confidence range around every decision point and every critical uncertainty. What’s the value of being wrong on the good side? What’s the penalty for being wrong on the bad side?

Is it reasonable to expect that someone did that sort of analysis on all the critical bits having to do with setting up and operating a tower crane in a metropolitan area. I would think so. Should the safe operation of something as big as a building and as heavy as a ship hinge on something from the "seat belt" family of products? If that’s all there is to the story, obviously not.

A reasonable question for you is, do you have any seat belts in what you do when steel cables are a better choice? The answer is of course. We all do. So the better question is, and . . . ?

Tags: crane, collapse, New York City, WABC, nylon rope, $50, decision making, risk, uncertainty, sensitivity analysis, decision quality