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Meltdown: Why Our Systems Fail and What We Can Do About It

Marc-Antony Payne
British Airways Flight 38, which crashed just short of the runway at its destination in 2008

This episode originally aired on March 29, 2018.

Train derailments, oil spills, bankruptcies, medical errors, and data breaches - every week, the news gives us glaring examples of how mistakes in these complex systems can blossom into massive failures. 

On this River to River segment, host Ben Kieffer talks with Chris Clearfield, the co-author of MELTDOWN: Why Our Systems Fail and What We Can Do About It. In the book, he reveals the surprising ways in which these occurrences of modern life are connected, as well as how to prevent these sort of breakdowns. 

Clearfield is a former derivatives trader, licensed commercial pilot, and graduate of Harvard University, where he studied physics and biology. He has written about complexity and failure for The Guardian, Forbes, and the Harvard Kennedy School Review.

Ben Kieffer is the host of IPR's River to River