Chrysler Shutdown Could Push Parts Makers to the Brink

May 1, 2009 — admin

We’re starting to see rumblings of the cascade failure I wrote about previously.

Suppliers may go bankrupt because of the bankruptcy filings above. Suppliers may hold off on shipping parts without assurances they aren’t going to lose money in the bankruptcy. Either action idles assembly plants, cutting off the cash flow the car company needs to emerge from bankruptcy.

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Examples of Cascade Failures

April 29, 2009 — admin

Here are some other examples of cascade failures:

  1. The 1965 blackout on the east coast of North America.
  2. The 2003 blackout, again on the east coast.
  3. A bank run is not by itself a cascade failure, but if it causes runs on other ones, it is.
  4. The stock market crash of 2008.
  5. The final fall of the World Trade Towers.
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Cascade Failures

April 27, 2009 — admin

For another article I’m writing, I need an online definition of a cascade failure. I wasn’t very happy with the Wikipedia definition, so I thought I’d fine tune it a bit. You might want to click on theirs too.

A cascade is a series of waterfalls that follow one another sequentially.

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