<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom">
  <channel>
    <title>Engineered Flaws</title>
    <link>https://engineeredflaws.com</link>
    <description>Forensic analysis of systemic failures, infrastructure incidents, and the technology disasters hiding in plain sight.</description>
    <language>en-us</language>
    <lastBuildDate>Sat, 19 Sep 2026 05:26:18 GMT</lastBuildDate>
    <atom:link href="https://engineeredflaws.com/feed.xml" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/>
    
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Hyatt Regency Walkway Collapse: When a 2-Minute Drawing Revision Killed 114 People]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/hyatt-regency-walkway-collapse</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/hyatt-regency-walkway-collapse</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[A forensic breakdown of the deadliest structural failure in US history prior to 2001: how a hasty contractor change doubled the critical load on a single welded box beam. - On July 17, 1981, two suspended walkways inside the Hyatt Regency hotel collapsed during a dance contest. This postmortem examines how casual hand-offs and unverified shop drawings turned an elegant architectural feature into a catastrophic guillotine.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 14 Oct 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[Podcast Notes & WTYP]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Citigroup Center Crisis: The 59-Story Skyscraper That Almost Fell on Manhattan]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/citigroup-center-crisis</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/citigroup-center-crisis</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[How an undergraduate architecture student discovered that quartering winds would shear the bolted chevron joints of New York's iconic tower—and the secret midnight welding operation race against Hurricane Ella. - In 1978, chief structural engineer William LeMessurier realized his celebrated 59-story Manhattan skyscraper had a fatal flaw: a contractor had replaced welded joints with bolts, leaving the tower vulnerable to collapse in a 16-year storm. What followed was one of the most daring, covert engineering rescues in history.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sat, 02 Nov 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[Disaster Postmortems]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Sampoong Department Store Collapse: When Greed Sliced Through Flat-Slab Concrete]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/sampoong-department-store-collapse</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/sampoong-department-store-collapse</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[The forensic anatomy of South Korea's deadliest peacetime disaster: how replacing columns with roller rinks, dragging 30-ton cooling towers across the roof, and ignoring catastrophic deflections killed 502 people in 20 seconds. - On June 29, 1995, the prestigious Sampoong Department Store in Seoul Pancaked into its basement within twenty seconds. Behind the luxury facade was a staggering succession of structural violations: halved columns, omitted shear reinforcement, and 30-ton air conditioning units dragged over brittle flat-slab concrete.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 12 Nov 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[Disaster Postmortems]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Boston Molasses Flood: When 2.3 Million Gallons of Viscous Sludge Swept the North End at 35 MPH]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/boston-molasses-flood-1919</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/boston-molasses-flood-1919</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[Forensic breakdown of the Purity Distilling Company tank rupture: how razor-thin steel plates, zero hydrostatic testing, and criminal cost-cutting drowned 21 people in a 15-foot sticky tsunami. - On January 15, 1919, a 50-foot steel storage tank in Boston's North End tore apart with the sound of machine-gun fire. A two-story wave of dense industrial molasses traveling at 35 miles per hour obliterated houses, smashed an elevated train trestle, and claimed 21 lives. Here is the mechanical autopsy of a disaster born of corporate haste.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 18 Nov 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[The Human Factor]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Grenfell Tower Fire: The Chimney Effect of Combustible Cladding and Regulatory Capture]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/grenfell-tower-disaster</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/grenfell-tower-disaster</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[How value-engineered aluminum composite material (ACM) polyethylene panels turned a 24-story residential high-rise into an unstoppable vertical furnace. - On June 14, 2017, a kitchen fire in a fourth-floor flat in North Kensington breached a window frame and ignited the building's newly refurbished facade. Within minutes, flames raced 20 stories upward through combustible polyethylene cladding, exposing decades of regulatory deregulation and lethal cost-cutting.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Mon, 25 Nov 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[The Human Factor]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The Sinking of the MS Estonia: When a Bow Visor Failed in the Open Baltic]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/ms-estonia-disaster</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/ms-estonia-disaster</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[The hydrodynamic catastrophe of roll-on/roll-off (Ro-Ro) ferry design: how substandard locking pins, free surface effect, and wave slam tore off the bow door in heavy seas. - On the stormy night of September 28, 1994, the 15,000-ton cruise ferry MS Estonia sank in the Baltic Sea in less than an hour, taking 852 lives. The forensic investigation revealed a fatal design paradox in roll-on/roll-off ships: an undivided vehicle deck that transforms small leaks into catastrophic capsizes.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 05 Dec 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[Technical Readings]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title><![CDATA[The FIU Pedestrian Bridge Collapse: Accelerated Construction Meets Wilful Blindness]]></title>
      <link>https://engineeredflaws.com/article/fiu-pedestrian-bridge-collapse</link>
      <guid isPermaLink="true">https://engineeredflaws.com/article/fiu-pedestrian-bridge-collapse</guid>
      <description><![CDATA[An exhaustive technical autopsy of the 2018 Miami bridge failure: how FIGG Bridge Engineers miscalculated node 11/12 interface shear and retensioned cracked PT tendons above live highway traffic. - On March 15, 2018, a 174-foot concrete pedestrian bridge spanning an eight-lane highway at Florida International University suddenly collapsed, crushing cars stopped at a red light. This postmortem deconstructs the fatal convergence of bad math, accelerated construction hype, and criminal disregard for 40-inch shear cracks.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 12 Dec 2024 10:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <category><![CDATA[Podcast Notes & WTYP]]></category>
      <author>Editorial Desk</author>
    </item>
  </channel>
</rss>