0:15

Pushkin. This

0:20

thing still on. Michael

0:22

Lewis here. Guess what. I'm

0:24

working on a second season of Against the Rules.

0:27

I had so much fun doing season one that I decided

0:29

to keep going. I'm back in the

0:31

field with my producers, talking to people and poking

0:34

around. The next season is

0:36

going to be about coaches and why the

0:38

role of coach has expanded so far

0:40

beyond sports in American life.

0:43

If everybody hates the ref, everyone

0:45

seems to love the coach these days. In

0:48

season two, I'm going to

0:50

explore why it's

0:53

out next spring. Meanwhile,

0:56

I have something else for you to listen to. It's

0:58

a new show from Pushkin Industries by

1:01

a British writer I really admire. His

1:04

name is Tim Harford. He's

1:06

a familiar voice on the BBC. Whereas

1:08

most recent series was about the modern

1:10

inventions we might not have noticed but

1:13

would shape our lives, this

1:16

new show from Tim is called

1:18

Cautionary Tales, and it's

1:20

full of spectacular stories about

1:23

other people's mistakes, my

1:25

favorite kind of mistakes. Tim

1:28

and his team of actors re enact airship

1:31

disasters and great frauds

1:34

and safety systems gone awry, and

1:36

then he tells us what we can learn from it all.

1:40

We've got one of the first episodes right here.

1:43

This one is an unbelievable story

1:45

about an enormous tanker about

1:47

to crash into the coast

1:50

of England. Give it a listen,

1:53

then go subscribe to Cautionary Tales

1:55

wherever you listen to your podcasts to

1:57

hear more from Tim. And I promise

2:00

I'll be back in this feed before you know it.

2:03

Here's Tim Harford. I

2:06

opened the wrapping paper hurriedly with nervous

2:08

hands, excited to get at the gift inside.

2:11

Little did I know, disaster

2:14

was about to enter my previously happy

2:16

childhood. It wasn't a disaster

2:19

visited on mean or my family. It

2:21

was a catalog of disasters for everyone

2:23

else. For the gift was a book,

2:26

and it was titled, in bold letters on a

2:28

blood red background, the World's

2:31

Greatest Mistakes. The

2:33

stories were set out like a trashy

2:35

and exciting tabloid newspaper. Some

2:38

were absurd, like the bride who

2:40

accidentally married the best man. Some

2:42

of them were famous tragedies, the Titanic

2:45

slipping beneath the icy sea,

2:48

funny or sad. All of them fascinated

2:50

me, and I realized something that

2:52

has guided me throughout my life. Learning

2:55

from other people's mistakes is

2:57

a lot less painful than learning from

2:59

your own. My name

3:01

is Tim Harford. Some people call me

3:04

the undercover Economist. I

3:06

use scientific ideas to help

3:08

people think more clearly about the

3:10

world in my books, my ted

3:12

Talks, my BBC shows, and my

3:14

column for the Financial Times. That

3:17

may sound all very grown up, but

3:20

part of me is that little boy who

3:22

loved stories of catastrophe, mistake

3:25

and mayhem.

3:27

So I still seek out and collect such stories,

3:30

but now I probe the details. I

3:33

challenge the orthodox view and look

3:35

for the root causes and ponder how

3:37

disaster could have been prevented. In

3:40

short, I look for the painless

3:42

lessons they can teach me. And now

3:45

I want to share some of these cautionary

3:47

tales with you too. Each

3:52

story has a moral, each

3:54

story is true, and each

3:57

story, if you're not careful,

3:59

could happen to you. So

4:02

gather closer and I'll begin.

4:16

We pray thee Lord, not that

4:19

rex should happen, but that

4:21

if any Rex do happen,

4:24

thou wilt guide them to the silly isles

4:26

for the benefit of the poor. Inhabitants.

4:31

That's an old prayer from the Isles

4:33

of Scilly. The isles are

4:35

just off the coast of Cornwall, the southwest

4:38

tip of Great Britain, and that

4:40

prayer has been answered many times.

4:43

The rocks around the islands have a fearsome

4:45

reputation and it's well earned.

4:49

One autumn night in seventeen oh

4:51

seven, the Royal Navy lost its

4:53

way in a storm. The flagship

4:55

HMS Association struck

4:57

a rock and went down in minutes.

5:00

Eight hundred men drowned behind

5:03

it. HMS Saint George hit the rocks

5:06

and became stuck. So did HMS

5:08

Phoenix, did HS Firebrow.

5:11

HMS Romney lost her entire

5:13

crew. HMS Eagle was

5:15

shattered on the cruel stone. Hundreds

5:18

more sailors died. That

5:20

dreadful night was one of the worst

5:23

disasters in the history of the British

5:25

Navy. Local

5:32

legend has it that there was one

5:34

notable survivor, that the Commander

5:37

in Chief of the British Fleets, Sir

5:39

Cloudsley Shovel, was washed up

5:42

on the beaches of the Aisles of Scilly, but

5:44

was strangled by a local

5:46

woman who fancied wearing

5:48

his Emerald ring herself if

5:51

she had been praying the old prayer God

5:55

or the devil had been listening.

5:59

It is a dark tale, but

6:02

the story I shall tell you today is

6:04

a far stranger one. It

6:09

was some time after dawn on

6:12

Saturday March the eighteenth, nineteen

6:14

sixty seven. Martyr

6:18

Christie was a langoustier, a French

6:20

lobster boat, fishing for crayfish

6:22

and crab between the mainland and the Isles

6:25

of Scilly. Twenty one miles further west

6:28

on deck was Captain Gui Folich,

6:31

another langoustier, was near by, both

6:33

of them enjoying rich pickings. A few

6:36

hundred yards north of the Seven Stones.

6:39

The Seven Stones make up a vicious reef

6:41

about one third of the way between the Isles

6:43

of Scilly and the mainland. At

6:46

low tide, the unyielding rocks

6:48

are visible, but even at high

6:50

tide there marked by a lighthouse vessel

6:53

warning ships to stay away. Gui

6:56

Folich looked up from his lobster lions

6:58

to see an unexpected sight, a

7:01

vast black hull coming over

7:03

the horizon from an unusual

7:05

direction. He was surprised.

7:08

A major vessel in that position would

7:10

usually have passed outside of the aisles

7:13

of Scilly rather than squeezing

7:15

between them and the mainland. True,

7:18

a big ship could come between the aisles

7:21

of Scilly and the mainland, passing on either

7:23

side of the seven Stones, but it

7:25

would be a little on the tight side. And

7:28

this ship, a supertanker,

7:31

was very big. Indeed, in

7:33

fact, it was the thirteenth biggest

7:36

ship in the world. On

7:39

the lighthouse vessel, the two seamen

7:41

on watch saw the tanker approaching too.

7:44

Have you seen this? Have you? Yeah?

7:46

Look at that big bastro coming up. Gifolich

7:50

could see the huge ship coming straight

7:53

towards him as he fished kayak,

7:57

but he wasn't worried. In between

7:59

him and the oncoming juggernaut were

8:01

the seven Stones. He

8:04

later said, I was sure that before

8:06

ever eating us, you would go on to

8:08

the rugs. He yelled to his men, stop

8:12

work, you're going to see something extraordinary.

8:16

All seven of them lined up on the rail

8:18

of Marta Christie to watch the oil

8:21

tanker bear closer and

8:23

closer, four

8:25

miles, three miles.

8:29

Folich was sure it was doomed. It

8:31

just wasn't possible to turn a supertanker

8:33

that quickly. Was it? Actually?

8:36

Folich wasn't quite right. The

8:39

tanker, whose name was Torry

8:42

Canyon did still have room

8:44

to turn. This wasn't

8:46

a storm tossed fleet of sailing ships

8:49

fumbling through the darkness. The

8:51

weather was good, the visibility

8:53

was good. Torry Canyon was

8:55

a superb ship, in fine working

8:58

order and armed with radar. The

9:00

seven Stones were clearly marked on every

9:03

chart, as well as being identified by

9:05

the position of the lighthouse vessel. But

9:08

Tory Canyon still wasn't

9:11

turning. Gather

9:14

close and listen to my

9:16

cautionary tail. Nobody

9:29

knew it at the time, but the trouble all

9:31

started with a radio message from milford

9:33

Haven, the harbor towards which Torry

9:36

Canyon was sailing. Milford

9:38

Haven is a major UK port, and

9:40

the thing you need to know about ports in the UK

9:43

is that the difference between high tide and

9:45

low tide can be enormous. What's

9:48

more, there are high tides and high tides,

9:51

some are higher than others. The

9:53

message from Milford Haven was simple

9:56

enough. Torry Canyon needed

9:58

to hurry. If the ship didn't

10:00

arrive by eleven pm on Saturday

10:02

evening, March the eighteenth, nineteen

10:05

sixty seven, it would miss the

10:07

extra high tide wouldn't

10:09

be able to slip into the harbor and dock. It

10:12

would then have to wait another six

10:15

days before the tide would once

10:17

more be high enough. Missing

10:19

the eleven pm deadline would mean

10:21

a very expensive delay. That

10:25

news put Captain Pastrengo Rugiati

10:27

under pressure. He had no more

10:30

than one or two hours margin, not

10:32

a lot, but Rujiahti had

10:34

coped with worse. He'd been a navigator

10:36

on an Italian submarine during the war,

10:39

had survived a German prison camp, and

10:41

had been commanding oil tankers for twenty

10:43

years. Captain Rujati

10:45

was in many ways a genial fellow, chatty

10:48

and hospitable. He liked to eat good

10:50

food, but insisted he shouldn't

10:52

be served anything that wasn't available to his crew.

10:55

As a result, the men on Torry Canyon

10:58

ate very well. But Rujiahti

11:00

was also a detailsman who kept

11:02

a close eye on his officers. Rugiasty

11:04

was extremely conscientious. He

11:07

was a man who wanted to know absolute,

11:09

loutely everything. Perhaps

11:11

because of that, Ruggiati stayed up

11:13

late on the Friday night before landfall preparing

11:16

the paperwork for when they docked. It

11:18

was only at half past three in the morning

11:21

that he went to bed, leaving instructions

11:23

that he was to be awakened first thing when

11:25

the Aisles of Silly were sighted. It

11:29

was half past six in the morning when the Aisles

11:31

of Scilly appeared on the radar, about thirty

11:33

five miles away. First

11:35

Officer Silvano Bonfilio was

11:37

on duty, and the position of the ship

11:40

relative to the Isles of Scilly was an

11:42

unpleasant surprise. Torry

11:44

Canyon, plowing through the night

11:46

across the ocean had been pushed

11:48

off its intended course by the current

11:51

and the winds. It was now headed

11:54

between the islands and the mainland.

11:57

Bonfilio immediately changed course,

11:59

steering away from the channel, figuring

12:01

that Captain Rugiati had intended to pass

12:04

outside of the islands, but

12:06

he hedged his beds. Rather

12:08

than out to sea or closer

12:10

to the mainland, he was bearing straight

12:13

towards the Isles of Scilly. He

12:16

then woke up Captain Ruggiati. Rugiati

12:19

was angry. Was it because Bonfilio

12:21

had changed course without checking, Was

12:23

it because the new course was neither one thing

12:25

nor another? Or was he just sleep

12:27

deprived will our

12:30

original heaving of eighteen degrees be

12:32

free of the Sillies? Yes, then

12:34

continue on course eighteen degrees. I

12:36

intend to pass to the starboard of the Silly

12:38

Isles. When

12:41

Filio was so surprised he had

12:43

to check that it understood the order, which

12:45

irritated Ruggiati. Still further Still,

12:49

a maneuver shouldn't be too perilous. It

12:52

was perfectly possible to get even a large

12:54

ship through. The

13:00

standard manual for navigating the waters

13:02

around the coast of the British Isles is

13:04

called the Channel Pilot. If

13:07

Captain Ruggiati had consulted a copy,

13:09

here's what it would have said. The actual

13:11

width of the channel between the nearest of the Silly

13:14

Islands and Land's End is twenty

13:16

one miles, but as the route taken

13:18

by all large vessels should be eastward

13:20

of seven stones light vessel, the navigable

13:23

channel can only be considered as twelve

13:25

miles wide. The lights render

13:27

the passage perfectly simple at night as

13:29

well as by day in ordinarily clear

13:32

weather. But as there is no part

13:34

of the coast of England more subject to sudden

13:36

changes of weather, the greatest vigilance

13:39

is necessary and a vessel's position,

13:41

even in the clearest weather, should be checked

13:43

by cross bearings at short intervals.

13:46

But Captain Rugiati Alas did

13:49

not have a copy of the channel pilot

13:51

on board, and so he missed

13:53

two important pieces of wisdom.

13:56

First, if you want to go between

13:59

the Isles of Scilly and the mainland, be

14:01

careful. Second,

14:04

pass between the mainland and the seven

14:07

Stones. There is an alternative route

14:09

between the seven Stones and the Aisles of Silly

14:11

themselves, but the channel pilot doesn't

14:13

mention it because it's narrower, six

14:15

and a half miles wide rather than twelve.

14:18

Why take the narrower channel when you could take

14:20

the broader one. Of course, you

14:23

could still fit an oil tanker through

14:25

the narrower gap, even an oil

14:27

tanker that's nearly as big as the Chrysler

14:29

building, but you'd be cutting it close.

14:32

You'd be better and nothing

14:34

went wrong. Inertia

14:53

is a powerful thing. That's

14:55

true for an oil tanker the size of Torry

14:58

Canyon, which needed nearly five

15:00

minutes to make a ninety degree turn, during

15:02

which time it would travel a mile and

15:04

a half at cruising speed. But

15:07

inertia is a powerful thing for humans.

15:09

Too. We also sometimes

15:12

struggle to change course. Psychologists

15:15

have identified a strong bias towards

15:17

the status quo. For example,

15:20

whether we sign up for a workplace pension

15:22

plan or not seems to depend on whatever

15:24

the status quo is. If

15:26

the default option is to sign up, we

15:29

sign up. If the default is to stay out,

15:31

we stay out. As I say,

15:34

inertia is powerful. Psychologists

15:38

who study accidents have a name for

15:40

a particular form of inertia.

15:43

They call it plan continuation

15:45

bias. It's best known

15:48

in aviation. Pilots form

15:50

a plan and then are reluctant to change

15:52

it, even if the circumstances

15:54

suggest they should. The

15:57

pilots themselves have another name for

15:59

it, get their itis.

16:02

The classic form of get their itis

16:04

is an approach to an airfield with a

16:06

storm coming in. If you

16:09

and well before the storm arrives, no

16:11

problem. If the storm arrives

16:13

before you land, that's not a crisis

16:15

either. It's a hassle. You have to divert

16:18

to another airfield, with all the delay, expense

16:20

and annoyance that implies. But

16:23

you do it because you don't want to fly into a

16:25

dangerous storm.

16:29

The risk comes, and the storm

16:31

is closing in, but there's still a

16:33

window of opportunity to land. The

16:36

landing strip is so close, just minutes

16:38

away. Tunnel vision sets

16:41

in, people start to hurry, Margins

16:43

for error are stripped away. Usually

16:46

there's no harm done. The pilot lands

16:48

just as the storm rips across, and

16:50

congratulates himself or herself

16:53

for keeping cool and showing skill

16:55

under pressure. But sometimes

16:57

the consequences are more serious. One

17:01

study of get their Itis looked at twenty

17:04

occasions when thunderstorms had closed

17:06

in at Hartsfield Jackson, Atlanta's

17:09

major international airport. Again

17:11

and again, pilots decided to

17:13

chant a risky landing, risky

17:16

in the sense that the Federal Aviation Administration's

17:19

official guidelines would have advised

17:21

against it. One plane

17:23

after another would land under ever

17:25

more perilous conditions, until

17:28

eventually one flight crew

17:31

would resist the inertia and decide

17:33

to divert elsewhere. At that

17:35

point, every subsequent plane

17:37

would also decide to divert. The

17:40

madness only ended when someone

17:42

set an example and changed the plan.

17:51

I'm no airline pilots, but I sometimes

17:53

suffer from get their itis in my own life.

17:56

Perhaps you do too. For me, it

17:58

tends to emerge when dealing with family logistics.

18:01

I've got three children at two different schools,

18:03

and they all have their hobbies and sports and all

18:05

usual things. I'm sure many

18:07

parents will be familiar with the play spinning that

18:09

this sometimes involves. But then

18:12

something goes wrong. The cars in the shop

18:14

to be repaired, No problem, we can bike instead.

18:17

Then someone needs to be at home to meet the

18:19

plumber. We make contingency plans

18:21

and they seem like they'll be fine, but then a

18:23

fresh errand appears, or a babysitter calls

18:25

to cancel. As complications

18:28

mount, the plan starts to resemble an

18:30

increasingly precarious assembly

18:32

of stages and steps, lift, swaps

18:34

and rendezvous. It's a Rube

18:36

Goldberg fever dream of an itinerary.

18:39

And then, if I'm lucky, either

18:42

I or my wife will find enough

18:44

headspace to say

18:48

this is crazy. Someone's

18:51

going to have to skip dance class tonight. We'll

18:53

call the plumber to see if tomorrow's okay.

18:55

Instead, we'll replace the entire

18:58

time and motion nightmare with

19:00

something radically simpler. But

19:03

that's hard to do because

19:06

of the inertia, because of the

19:08

plan continuation by us, and

19:10

the more the pressure mounts, the

19:12

harder it is to see clearly just

19:15

how precarious everything has become.

19:18

I become so fixated on executing

19:20

the plan that I don't have a moment

19:22

to realize that it's now a

19:25

stupid plan. Captain

19:29

Rugiati was under pressure to reach the

19:32

harbor at Milford Haven in time, and

19:34

had been woken with the unwelcome news

19:36

that the ship was off course too far

19:38

towards the mainland. If

19:40

he'd stopped to think or

19:42

to talk to his officers, he would

19:44

have realized that he still had time

19:47

to turn and go the long way round

19:49

outside the Aisles of Scilly. He

19:52

only had an hour or two to spare, but

19:54

a brief calculation would have revealed

19:57

that the detour would have cost just twenty

19:59

nine minutes. Yet

20:01

he didn't pause to reflect. He

20:04

snapped at Bonfilio and ordered him

20:06

to stick to the course that would now cut inside

20:08

the Isles of Scilly. Nor

20:10

did he reflect that, since his ship had already

20:13

been deflected by the current and the wind,

20:15

those forces might well continue to

20:18

work upon the ship, moving it

20:20

out of its intended position. Under

20:22

time pressure, he began to suffer get

20:25

their itis. His plan was

20:27

risky, and his plan was

20:29

not about to change. At

20:34

eight eighteen am, a junior

20:37

officer calculated their position, this

20:39

being the days before GPS. He did

20:41

it with the ship's charts, a compass bearing,

20:44

and a radar reading old school,

20:47

but the inexperienced officer was anxious.

20:50

He wasn't convinced he'd got the ship's position

20:52

exactly right, but he didn't

20:54

speak up. After all, there'd

20:56

be another chance to take a fix in ten minutes

20:58

or so. Captain

21:01

Rugiati wasn't speaking up either, as

21:03

the ship steamed north at sixteen

21:05

knots nearly twenty miles an hour.

21:08

He had already decided which course he would

21:10

take, but he hadn't told his

21:12

crew, which meant that they hadn't

21:14

had a chance to comment, and they didn't

21:17

feel entitled to ask. Captain

21:20

Rugatti had actually decided to pass

21:22

through the narrow channel, which involved

21:24

bending the ship's course in a long, slow

21:27

curve to the left. Why

21:30

Perhaps because it was the most direct route,

21:33

but mostly because well

21:35

why not? To me? It was, they say,

21:39

But should he not have taken just a few

21:41

more minutes to avoid the narrow route?

21:44

That was never in my mind. That's

21:47

a revealing turn of phrase. Never,

21:50

in my mind, Pastrenger Rugiati

21:53

didn't even consider the possibility

21:55

of going through the wider channel. And

21:58

while that might seem strange to you or me,

22:00

it's a natural feature of planned

22:02

continuation by us. As the

22:04

tunnel vision develops. We don't even

22:07

think about alternatives to our ishor

22:09

plan. We don't have the bandwidth. We

22:12

continue to plow on. In

22:29

two thousand and five, a young

22:31

boy was rushed into a hospital emergency

22:33

room. He suffered from asthma,

22:36

and he was in distress. He was finding it

22:38

harder to breathe and harder and

22:40

harder, and then his

22:42

breathing stopped. The medical

22:45

team quickly strapped an oxygen mask

22:47

on to the boy. That should have helped, but

22:49

instead his heart stopped beating

22:52

two. There were eight trained

22:54

medical professionals in the room, taking it in

22:56

turns to perform CPR on the boy.

22:59

Still no pulse, Still

23:01

no breathing. The minutes

23:04

ticked by a doctor

23:06

slid a breathing tube down the boy's throat.

23:09

No thing's happening. Is the tube in position? The tube's

23:11

fine? I checked, Is there any

23:13

pulse? Still nothing? Let's

23:15

take the breathing tube out and try the airbag again. It's

23:18

not helping. No,

23:21

it wasn't helping. And the reason

23:23

it wasn't helping was because the breathing

23:25

apparatus was broken. It

23:27

would have taken a few seconds to check

23:30

if any of the five nurses or

23:32

three doctors had thought to

23:34

check, but they didn't think,

23:37

not until the boy had been deprived of

23:39

oxygen for ten minutes.

23:44

Thankfully, this wasn't a tragedy.

23:46

It was a training exercise. Instead

23:49

of a real boy, it was a medical dummy

23:51

that was lying on the bed failing to produce

23:53

a simulated pulse or simulated respiration

23:56

because the medical team didn't

23:58

step back and think. This

24:04

training scenario was conducted nineteen

24:07

times, and videos of the exercise

24:09

were studded by Marlist Christiansen, a

24:11

professor of organizational behavior

24:14

and previously the doctor Professor.

24:18

Christiansen found that some medical teams

24:20

took just seconds to identify the problem

24:22

with a breathing equipment. This isn't working,

24:24

it's broken. That's impressive,

24:28

But perhaps more impressive were

24:30

the teams who started with the wrong theory

24:32

about the problem, but didn't get stuck

24:34

on that idea. They didn't fixate

24:37

on one possibility, or keep repeating

24:39

the same approach over and over again.

24:41

They would talk through what they were thinking

24:44

and challenge themselves and each other.

24:46

They could change course, but

24:49

not every team did that. Many

24:52

teams would hammer away at the same

24:54

plan, regardless of the signs that

24:56

it wasn't going to work. They

24:58

didn't step back and think, They

25:00

didn't talk things through, They just

25:03

kept going. Could

25:06

Captain Rugiati avoid the same

25:08

fate. Captain

25:15

Rugatti is now trying to curve

25:18

his ship through the narrower channel. He

25:20

doesn't even have the full six and a half

25:22

miles to aim at because he's approaching

25:25

at an angle. He's left himself

25:27

precious little margin for error. As

25:29

it is, Torry Canyon is

25:32

heading straight for the submerged rocks

25:35

at half past eight. As the slow,

25:38

slow turn begins, two

25:40

fishing boats appear on the radar, the

25:43

two French langoustiers that are watching

25:45

the oncoming supertanker with astonishment.

25:48

Rugiati had planned to keep turning,

25:51

but now he has to ensure he doesn't hit

25:53

the boats. Suddenly, floats

25:55

come into view. There are a sign of fishing

25:58

nets beneath the surface. Tory

26:00

Canyon can't possibly avoid them all

26:02

and slices through one set of nets.

26:05

Captain Rugiati pauses his turn

26:07

in order not to shred thet He's

26:11

now heading very close to where he thinks

26:13

the stones are, but he still hopes to

26:15

be able to resume his turn after

26:17

passing the nets. But

26:20

meanwhile, all the while,

26:22

the current has been gently, insistently

26:25

pushing Torry Canyon closer

26:28

and closer to the seven Stones.

26:31

At this point, Rugiati seems

26:33

to have woken up to the danger. He

26:35

has precious little room for maneuver. Rather

26:38

than curving out of danger, he's

26:40

heading directly towards the seven Stones.

26:43

He was later asked whether he would have been heading

26:45

that way if not for the fishing boats and their

26:47

nets. No, only a

26:49

madman would have followed. In northern course, Rugiati

26:52

now knows his heading is dangerous.

26:54

His plan to go through the narrow channel is

26:57

being frustrated, but as the pressure

26:59

rises, he can't step back

27:01

and form a better plan. Why

27:04

doesn't he slow down? Why doesn't

27:06

he abandon his plan to turn left into

27:08

the channel and instead turned sharply

27:11

right into deep water. That

27:13

was never in my mind. Never.

27:17

When get their itis takes hold

27:20

there are a lot of things that should be in our

27:22

minds but aren't. At

27:25

eight thirty eight am, Captain Ruggiati

27:28

takes a look at the charts. His junior

27:31

officer has just taken another bearing.

27:33

Ruggiati is an old hand. He can

27:36

see at once that it can't be right. The

27:38

crosses marking the ship's position should

27:41

be at regular intervals, but they're not. One

27:44

of the bearings is wrong. He doesn't

27:46

know which. Maybe they're both

27:48

wrong. Captain Ruggiati

27:51

doesn't know where he is. The

27:53

junior officer takes another bearing with the

27:55

Captain's help. The new fix

27:58

shows that the ship is closer to the seven

28:00

Stones than they're realized, less

28:02

than three miles. Remember,

28:04

Torry Canyon takes a mile and a half

28:06

to make a ninety degree turn on

28:09

his trawler. Watching with horror

28:12

guy Foliage has already concluded

28:15

that it's all over. Torry

28:17

Canyon can't possibly avoid

28:19

the rocks, but

28:22

he's wrong. There is still

28:24

time. There's still time to turn

28:26

into deep water. There's even still

28:28

time to turn into the channel, which is what Pastrengo

28:31

Rugiati has been trying to do for

28:33

the last four miles and so, even

28:36

though it doesn't really make sense anymore, that's

28:38

what he continues to try to do.

28:40

Helmsman can't do their wheel, Yes, Captain

28:43

hard to part. Go to three fifty,

28:46

Take her to three, take her to

28:48

three twenty. Rugiati is ordering

28:51

an ever tighter turn into the channel.

28:55

Captain. Captain, the ship's

28:57

are turning even now

29:00

there's still time. She's

29:03

not turning. Captain Rugiati needs

29:06

to think, why isn't the ship

29:08

turning? Perhaps the fuel

29:10

pumps controlling the rudder have broken. Rajati

29:13

has seen that happen before. He tries

29:15

to dial the engine room, but instead

29:18

he makes the kind of mistake you make

29:20

when you've had three hours sleep and

29:22

you only have seconds to solve a problem.

29:25

He calls the officers dining room.

29:28

Ah, captain, are you ready for breakfast?

29:30

Well? God deal, God

29:34

is a pig. That's some serious

29:36

blasphemy from a good Italian Catholic.

29:39

It's the blasphemy of a man who

29:42

knows time has just

29:44

run out. There's

30:10

a photograph of Pastrenga Rugiati.

30:12

I can't get out of my head. He's

30:15

scrunched up in a confined space,

30:17

his knees tucked into his chest

30:20

as if to protect himself. His eyes

30:22

rolled sharply to one side, his

30:25

face ghoulishly lit from below.

30:28

He's wearing a hospital gown and

30:30

he's hiding under a hospital bed. That's

30:33

where he was when the paparazzi found

30:35

him. He looks terrified.

30:38

He's broken. His

30:41

ship was gone, impaling

30:43

itself onto the Seven Stones at full

30:45

speed with a noise. One

30:48

crewman said, look a slab of lead

30:50

being ripped by spikes. Watching

30:55

from his trawler, Gefolich turned

30:58

to his men, that's the end of her.

31:01

She'll never get off. He

31:04

was right. The crew

31:06

escaped safely, but during an attempt

31:08

to re float the ship, there was a huge

31:10

explosion. One of the salvage

31:12

team was killed. By

31:15

then, Torry Canyon's back was

31:17

already broken and her underbelly

31:19

sliced open by the teeth of the reef.

31:22

She was bleeding one hundred and nineteen

31:25

thousand tons of crude oil into

31:27

coastal waters. It was an

31:29

environmental catastrophe. The

31:32

oil spill was unprecedented. Even

31:35

today, there are places where you can still

31:37

see the dark stain on the coast. Torry

31:40

Canyon was, at the time the

31:42

largest shipwreck in history and

31:45

the largest maritime insurance claim.

31:49

Rugiati took responsibility. He

31:51

was the captain, and he was, he said,

31:54

in charge of the best ship in their world

31:56

for a ship's captain. His ship is

31:59

all and I have lost

32:01

mine. I'm terrified

32:03

by the dimensions which the accident

32:05

has assumed. The

32:08

inquiry was conducted in private.

32:11

Journalists weren't allowed in, but

32:14

the manager of the hotel where the proceedings

32:16

were being held told one of them that

32:18

he had seen Captain Rugiati. I

32:20

had a glimpse of this man. I

32:23

had the impression of a man finished. He

32:26

very seldom have so strong an impression from

32:28

so short of seeing a man. I must

32:31

answer for everything, for

32:33

everyone. I must

32:35

carry the cross alone. I

32:38

wish I could tell the people of Cornwall

32:41

how sorry I am, And he

32:43

really was sorry. It

32:46

was very bad. The

32:51

disaster broke Rugiati. He

32:54

spent months in hospital recovering

32:56

from the strain and the anxiety and the heartbreak,

32:59

which is where the eager photographers

33:02

found him.

33:04

A transcript of the inquiry was

33:07

leaked to the journalist Richard Petro.

33:10

The tanker owners were keen to downplay

33:12

any fault on their part, including

33:14

the fact that the steering had broken in the past,

33:17

confusing Captain Ruggiati when

33:19

the ship had failed to turn. But

33:22

why had the ship failed to turn

33:24

in those last moments? It

33:27

was a small thing. After Ruggiahti

33:29

had accidentally called the officer's dining

33:32

room and slammed down the receiver, he

33:34

looked across the bridge. From

33:36

his position by the telephone, he

33:38

could see that someone had inadvertently

33:41

knocked the steering control lever.

33:43

The ship's steering had simply

33:46

been disconnected. All Ruggiati

33:48

needed to do was switched the lever back

33:51

and dragged Torry Canyon over

33:53

to port. But he had lost

33:55

time. With thirty seconds

33:58

more to maneuver, I could have avoided

34:00

the rocks. Ruggiati

34:03

had made a plan, and as one

34:05

small problem after another made

34:07

the plan riskier and risk here

34:10

he hadn't been able to adjust. Many

34:13

leader things added up to one big

34:16

disaster. That's true. The

34:19

deadline, the currents, the fishing

34:21

boats, the error from his junior

34:23

officer, the steering control. It's

34:26

bad luck thirty seconds before

34:29

the sheep she was saved.

34:32

But the missing thirty seconds

34:34

aren't what interests me. What

34:37

interests me are the two hours

34:40

that Ruggiati had to save

34:42

his Torry Canyon, the best

34:44

ship in the world. He

34:46

had two hours to reroot

34:49

outside the aisles of Scilly,

34:51

two hours to slow the ship down,

34:53

two hours to ask for advice or

34:55

to turn towards the wider channel, but

34:58

he didn't do any of those things. After

35:03

the exploitative photograph was released,

35:05

there was a surge of sympathy for Ruggiati

35:08

from around the world. People wrote

35:11

letters of consolation. One

35:13

that caught my eye was from a thirteen year

35:15

old boy from County Cork in Ireland.

35:18

I see beautiful tankers, but I'm

35:20

sure I've never seen one as beautiful as yours.

35:23

I thought and prayed for you. I

35:25

am sure you will sail the seas again. Pastrengo

35:30

Rougiati never did. His

35:32

mistake was just too grave,

35:35

But at the same time, it was also

35:37

all too human. After

35:40

all, it's our nature to

35:42

be slow to change course. You've

35:54

been listening to Cautionary Tales.

35:56

If you'd like to find out more about the ideas

35:58

in this episode, including links to our

36:00

sources, the show notes are on my website,

36:03

Tim Harford dot com.

36:05

Cautionary Tales is written and presented

36:08

by me Tim Harford. Our producers

36:10

are Ryan Dilley and Marilyn Rust.

36:13

The sound designer and mixer was Pascal

36:15

Wise, who also composed the

36:17

amazing music. This

36:20

season stars Alan Cumming, Archie

36:23

Panchabi, Toby Stevens and Russell

36:25

Tovey, with enso Celenti, Ed

36:28

Gochen, Melanie Gutteridge, Mercia

36:30

Munroe, Rufus Wright and introducing

36:33

Malcolm Gladwell. Thanks

36:36

to the team at Pushkin Industries, Julia

36:38

Barton, Heather Faine, mil LaBelle,

36:41

Carlie Milliori, Jacob Weisberg

36:43

and of course the mighty Malcolm

36:46

Gladwell. And thanks to my colleagues

36:48

at The Financial Times