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What Went Wrong?: Case Histories of Process Plant Disasters and How They Could Have Been Avoided

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"What Went Wrong?" has revolutionized the way industry views safety. The new edition continues and extends the wisdom, innovations and strategies of previous editions, by introducing new material on recent incidents, and adding an extensive new section that shows how many accidents occur through simple miscommunications within the organization, and how strightforward changes in design can often remove or reduce opportunities for human errors. Kletz' approach to learning as deeply as possible from previous experiences is made yet more valuable in this new edtion, which for the first time brings together the approaches and cases of "What Went Wrong" with the managerially focussed material previously published in "Still Going Wrong." Updated and supplemented with new cases and analysis, this fifth edition is the ultimate resource of experienced based anaylsis and guidance for the safety and loss prevention professionals.* A million dollar bestseller, this trusted book is updated with new material, including the Texas City and Buncefield incidents, and supplemented by material from Trevor Kletz's 'Still Going Wrong'* Now presents a complete analysis of the design, operational and for the first time, managerial causes of process plant accidents and disasters, plus their aftermaths* Case histories illustrate what went wrong, why it went wrong, and then guide readers in how to avoid similar learn from the mistakes of others

640 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 1, 1998

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About the author

Trevor A. Kletz

16 books7 followers

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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
Profile Image for Manugw.
291 reviews11 followers
June 13, 2011
ENLIGHTENING STUFF

Mr Kletz offers engaging technical insights with case stories arising out of his long professional experience related to accidents causing small to large property damage and bodily injury including death and demonstrates that they just arise from silly mistakes made during everyday work or by having misconceptions about the laws of physics or process engineering

It is focused on occurrences in the chemical industry but the case stories serve as an example for property loss prevention in any industry (among the chapters it delves into are: maintenance, modifications, pressure pipes and vessels, hazard of materials, computers, human errors, storage tanks, labeling)

It is a slow paced reading, written to focus on ideas and develop concepts to have something new to think about. Most suitable readers are loss control & process engineers and health and safety professionals working in any type of industry or doing field surveys for insurance companies
Profile Image for Manugw.
291 reviews11 followers
June 13, 2011
A MUST READ FOR PROFESSIONALS OF INDUSTRIAL LOSS PREVENTION

A sequel of What Went Wrong?, Fourth Edition: Case Studies of Process Plant Disasters]] by Trevor Kletz

Both books referred to me by a highly qualified colleague

The author lectures about loss prevention in order to avoid accidents by way of cases he has stumbled upon during his professional experience

He shows how self-confidence, ignorance, and engineering misconceptions & myths can lead to awful tragedies in terms of property damage and loss of life

In this second book, with the same structure as "What went wrong", what I have found is far better crystal clear examples, more simple language and more concrete enlightening concepts

Having 12 years experience to date working in Health & Safety and Loss Control Engineering, and having visited more than 1000 factories of every kind and size in Argentina, (I work with a large corporate local insurance broker), both, this book and "What went wrong" helped me to understand better some subjects very difficult to comprehend (i.e risks with static electricity), just to mention one of the many

The explanations about corrosion related to tanks and the explosion in a tank that contained only water, were very enlightening indeed, I mean this last one incredible

I hope Mr Kletz publishes further work
Profile Image for Gharonk.
53 reviews2 followers
August 5, 2007
I love Kletz's works on process safety.. his style to sum some short story pasted from philosophers, brings his work on a specific knowledge name "Process Safety" back into base.

I list his books in to the front row - since first time i read... my career also as Process Safety Engineer... wholly influenced by his writing in Process Safety.
1 review1 follower
April 8, 2013
very good
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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