John Pritchett
Tin Kickers: Thinking Like an Aircraft Crash Investigator takes readers inside the disciplined mindset used to solve the world’s most complex aviation disasters. Drawing on real accident case studies and the analytical tools of professional investigators, this book reveals how catastrophe is transformed into clarity-and how failure becomes the foundation of safety.Rather than chasing blame or headlines, accident investigators search for structure inside chaos. They map chains of cause and effect, trace human decisions under stress, expose design vulnerabilities, and uncover the organizational pressures that shape outcomes long before a crash ever occurs. This book introduces the core investigative methods used by the National Transportation Safety Board and safety agencies worldwide, including Fault Tree Analysis, Event Tree Analysis, Change Analysis, and Causal Factor Charting. Each method is explained through vivid real-world cases such as Tenerife, United 232, Air France 447, Swissair 111, and the Boeing 737 MAX.But Tin Kickers goes beyond technical analysis. It explores the human and organizational dimensions of failure-fatigue, communication, training, corporate culture, regulatory oversight, and the normalization of deviance. It shows how accidents rarely stem from a single mistake, but from systems quietly drifting toward danger. It also demonstrates how disciplined investigation turns tragedy into lasting reform.Written for aviation professionals, engineers, safety leaders, and readers fascinated by how complex systems fail, this book offers a rare look at how investigators actually think. Its lessons extend far beyond the cockpit, applying to healthcare, cybersecurity, public policy, and environmental risk.At its core, Tin Kickers is about prevention. It is about honoring lives lost not with speculation or blame, but with clarity, rigor, and reform. To think like a tin kicker is to see failure not as an ending, but as a puzzle that-once solved-can save lives.
