@@frankzaffuto3670 Similar to how we use one kilogram, even though it is a thousand grams, or a megabyte, which would be a million bytes (I'm not a linguist or anything, I might be wrong)
'Technical Hitch' during filming of UA-cam video causes .1 second fireworks display to stretch out to 10 minutes and sync up with "Pachelbel's Canon in D". The root cause investigation is in progress, but is expected to return a verdict of 'Human Error'.
Awesome video and super relevant for engineers! As an chemical process engineer a lot of our systems include several redundancies and checks throughout the day. The process is mostly autonomous, while the human element mostly maintains the controls and redundancies.
People should brush up on their NASA procedures. We didn't just go to the moon to get some rocks, which we kind did anyway, but to prove that following procedures, checklists, and pre-flight tests are important.
Oddly enough we're having a few major legal battles regarding human error in medicine at the moment - the Hadiza Bawa-Garba case being the key one. Turns out the terms "system failures" and "human error" go down far less well with NHS management than "find a scapegoat". Interested to here your thoughts Tom
William Easdown that system also has the demand that it should be able to activate on full scale as fast as possible at any time. The worst that can happen is not a false alarm, but a real alarm being delayed in critical situations. Still a huge mistake on their part
Watching this, I thought, "If they really hooked it up to that button, this is remarkably stupid. Tom cannot afford a retake of these shots with that type of error."
To be honest? I wouldn't have guessed that was not a normal fireworks shot if you hadn't told me. That did not look like 10 minutes worth of fireworks.
This designing for critical systems reminds me of Ecological Interface Design which I recently worked on. It's meant for exactly this kind of situation, but does it the other way around from what people usually do (and what the expert describes in the video): Instead of creating a blacklist of possible problems (if A, B or C goes wrong, we have a problem), you define a whitelist (only if D, E and F are true is the system working correctly). That way, you also catch problems that no one anticipated while building the system.
Absolutely right. In the software industry, we learn to automate deployments because saying “a developer hit the wrong button” is like saying a pilot hit the wrong button and killed hundreds
Awesome. My favourite fireworks booboo, has to be called something like Big Bay Boom, or Bang. I think in San Diego on a barge just off shore. It is unreal! I love how the spectators go from, wonder to worry in a few seconds.
I know everyone is going on about the spectacle of the fireworks, but thank you for raising the points of systemic failure vs individual error. It's something which I wish more people took notice of
This happened in San Diego on a much bigger scale. It sounds cool in theory, but they all go off at once and you just get a big flash of light and can't really see anything. Not too exciting.
I've done a fireworks show with a friend who is in the business. there is no better view than what the technicians get from underneath, truly spectacular.
Pure, unadaulterated joy. I'm so glad you included your reactions, they were even more satisfying to watch than the fireworks. That laugh really gives you a sense of what one must've felt to actually witness it in person. Love it!
It's like that scene in Malcolm in the Middle where they set off a firework so huge it just becomes daytime for a few seconds and they're blind for two days. Great video Tom!
Hey, congratulations on passing 1 million subscribers. Literally setting off ten minutes of fireworks in a matter of seconds is a fine way to celebrate.
Fabulous video I work for a minor league baseball team in the US. This team has about 15 post game firework shows per year. From that I have learned a bit about the behind the scenes of the shows. This video helped fill in the gaps.
I can imagine how that would have felt in their chests. I love the physical boom sensation during fireworks, having them all go off at once must have been amazing.
I was at Epcot several years ago on Independence Day. Supposedly, the engineers had scoured the warehouses looking for every shell that was left over from other shows, things that were otherwise just collecting dust. And they put them into the finale of Illuminations: Reflections of Earth. When the time came, the result was almost exactly what appears in this video... Except it lasted for several continuous minutes. It looked like daylight with a steady rumble.
When I was a kid, all families on the block would chip in to buy fireworks and then we'd all go to a vacant lot and the dads would set them off. When I was very small, there was a firework spinning around, attached to a telephone pole, a Catherine wheel (?). The problem was that it wasn't attached very well. So it spun off the pole and into the box with all the rest of the fireworks. Kids cheered, mothers screamed add grabbed kids and ran away as fast as they could and we had the greatest but shortest fireworks the neighborhood had ever seen. I think that was the last time we had a neighborhood fireworks show.
I wish more engineers understood this. If it's designed so it's possible to make a mistake, then people will make that mistake. The fact that 'go' and 'stop' in a car are both pedals on the floor that you push, and if you mix them up, someone dies has always shitted me to tears. But there are examples everywhere. I flew a helicopter that some genius had designed with two knobs on the dash. Pull one and the cabin got warm (heater control) pull the other and the cabin got quiet (fuel control). That's right, you could accidentally turn off the engine in a helicopter trying to turn on the heater. It was also designed so that when the passenger got out they would slide over the throttle and apply full throttle (predictably bad thing as you're trying to maintain a low hover).
i dont know what it is about fireworks, i just cant get enough of them! whenever there is something exploding, i need to see it! 😄probably should have created a channel where i blow things up instead of the content i create now 😉
That's spectacular. Great topic to investigate a bit more, too, as I've always wondered why something as potentially dangerous and therefore redundantly safeguarded as the pyrotechnics industry (having trained in it myself) ever has *any* misfires/accidents. As you pointed out, modern systems have multiple points of failure checking, so when you hear of these 'human error' moments it's often even more bamboozling as to how something could possibly go wrong.
An old adage: "Engineers are in a race with the Universe, trying to come up with tools that are more and more foolproof, while the Universe is producing bigger and bigger fools. So far, the Universe is winning." So, while I applaud the effort and appreciate the sentiment, the goal of eradicating human error can only be the negative implication of a mathematical limit: No matter how close you get, so long as you're restricted to the finite world, you can't get there.
I think you can really get it if you look at the background when they show the shot from the alternate perspective. The whole scene is lit brighter than day.
That was impressive, the thought of human errors causing disasters. This is why I love this channel. Thought provoking sophisticated stuff simply explained
I once heard a production manager scold an employee for sending out a part that was not yet ready for the customer. I remember hearing him responding with the very reasonable argument that delivering a part worth tens of thousands of dollars should not come down to one person. Rather, a system should have been in place that was clearly set up to prevent what had been a very common problem at that company. His words fell on deaf ears, and he eventually left the company. I learned a lot of useful information at that company. Largely from the mistakes they refused to avoid.
My uncle used to do this, before his friend died in an accident and he decided to teach fireworks safety. I used to have a hard time understanding that decision, cause I don't think I quite understood how dangerous his job was - I just thought it looked fun.
Normally, what I find to be one of the best parts of a professional fireworks display is when you're close enough to FEEL the sound of the fireworks exploding, but far away enough for there to be a delay. That feeling is lost entirely when just watching on a UA-cam video. It also didn't look as big as I expected. Tom Scott, did your entire body reverberate when they went off?
This was such a well designed video Tom! Also congrats on 1 megasubs!
late but megasubs is amazing
3 megasubs :)
Technically just a megasub, not multiple
@@jayd2279 🤨 explain.
@@frankzaffuto3670 Similar to how we use one kilogram, even though it is a thousand grams, or a megabyte, which would be a million bytes
(I'm not a linguist or anything, I might be wrong)
I knew the button wouldn’t do anything as it’s clearly the mystery biscuits button
MYSTERY BISCUITS!!!
CZ Frank OH YEAH!
Now what we need is a video edit that when he presses the button faintly in the distance you can hear the Mystery Biscuits jingle
Or...
Tom: "That's why this button doesn't do anything."
_[press button, cut to fireworks]_
noticed that too.
the entire time i was worried your hand gestures would accidentally hit the button
and that is a fantastic commentary on gun control....
@@kodaspaws You mean gun safety?
@@kodaspaws That's a perfect comment demonstrating how little the anti gun idiots know about guns.
@@HansPeter-qg2vc Feel free to explain....
@@viktor8986z7o both
Ok not many times in life do I get to put this comment on a video.........yeah that was good but you can do all that while riding a bike Muhahahaha.
ahaha
colinfurze there's always one person who has to do one-up, isn't there? Though, I suppose that's most of the point of your channel!
I seriously thought I watched one of your videos until the end card with Tom Scott came up.
300.000 more subscribers and we can find out what that looks like to!
colinfurze savage
RIP UA-cam compression
DeepSpace killed it
the original footage probably already has artifacts, recording fireworks without any is really tricky.
tommihommi1 Depends on his camera settings. Some professional equipment allows for storing uncompressed video data.
More confetti! More confetti!
tommihommi1 All Intra frame video is very popular on professional video cameras now. Should have very little artefacts filming fireworks.
'Technical Hitch' during filming of UA-cam video causes .1 second fireworks display to stretch out to 10 minutes and sync up with "Pachelbel's Canon in D". The root cause investigation is in progress, but is expected to return a verdict of 'Human Error'.
I wonder if there was any temptation in the sound edit to, when Tom presses the big red button, very quietly insert "Mystery Biscuits! oh yeah..."
Awesome video and super relevant for engineers! As an chemical process engineer a lot of our systems include several redundancies and checks throughout the day. The process is mostly autonomous, while the human element mostly maintains the controls and redundancies.
I was thinking about pilots as well! There are lots of accidents that were caused by badly designed checklists, or no checklists at all.
People should brush up on their NASA procedures. We didn't just go to the moon to get some rocks, which we kind did anyway, but to prove that following procedures, checklists, and pre-flight tests are important.
I'm a control system engineer; trust me, we have alot of checks, trips, interlocks, voters and redundancy. Much respect
Oddly enough we're having a few major legal battles regarding human error in medicine at the moment - the Hadiza Bawa-Garba case being the key one. Turns out the terms "system failures" and "human error" go down far less well with NHS management than "find a scapegoat".
Interested to here your thoughts Tom
I don't know how well this translates to a small UA-cam screen -- hopefully the reaction shot gives an idea of what it was like to be there!
Tom Scott hi
Who did pay for it and why did they do it? Was it test planned by the fireworks event company?
The reaction shot? Oh you mean you both giggling like a pair of schoolgirls? Yeah I figure we got the message :D
Tom Scott it does
+Benedikt Müssig Watch the Behind the Scenes video on the Matt and Tom channel.
'...Thats why this button doesn't do anything.'
*TOP 10 ANIME PLOT TWISTS*
I was about to be SUPER PISSED OFF
Nani?
daga, oboerarenai ne
kkonstantinosss2 Yakso Okurutsken
Dougy STAHP RIGHT THERE! It’s illegal to lewd those lolis! You’re under arrest!
Matt seems to have particularly enjoyed that.
Matt looks so happy!
When he walks up with the "Alright, show me." expression on his face. :D
Matt Gray bounced extra hard that day.
Yes! His reaction alone made me giggle :D
:3
The whole system design thing strongly reminds me of the Hawaii missile alert incident...
William Easdown
that system also has the demand that it should be able to activate on full scale as fast as possible at any time.
The worst that can happen is not a false alarm, but a real alarm being delayed in critical situations.
Still a huge mistake on their part
TBH just having a couple of checks isn't a significative delay, especially assuming that whoever controls that knows how to do the checks quickly.
William Easdown I thought of that too, maybe it was even an inspiration for this video.
I was wondering whether this video was in response to that incident.
Definitellyyyyyy think it was aimed at that
"This button doesn't do anything"
Fertilizer factory blows up in background*
This comment didn’t age well...
@@BullyBentley ?
@@BullyBentley what
Zynke what
@@BullyBentley what
If only the mystery biscuits button did that... every... single... time...
Oh Yeah!
Petition for that to happen
Pyrotechnics all going off at once? Bet they got fired.
Tom5tom Entertainment haha
No but the boss's face was incandescent when he found out.
Nah, they just went out with a bang.
Wow, the number of likes on your comment really exploded.
Please leave now.
Watching this, I thought, "If they really hooked it up to that button, this is remarkably stupid. Tom cannot afford a retake of these shots with that type of error."
How to ruin a video's quality- the expensive method.
AllThoughts 3rased I really hope that's a reference to his compression video.
Luke Bentley yep
To be honest? I wouldn't have guessed that was not a normal fireworks shot if you hadn't told me. That did not look like 10 minutes worth of fireworks.
Tom: the professionals over there do the firing.
Matt: *does the firing*
Matt staring agape into the sky and yelling 'AWESOME!' is my new favourite thing.
San Diego took inspiration from here
You learn a ton about this from programming. People will mess up, and they will do so in the most unimaginable ways possible.
"You make something foolproof, and then they invent a better idiot."
I love the childlike joy in Tom's face 😂💜
Matt's reaction was all that we needed to hear at the end to tell how good it was.
Extremely informative video and no one should skip straight to the launch because it is very anticlimactic
Launching mystery biscuits?
Oh yeah.
2 years later, UA-cam blesses us by sharing Tom's old magnificent video(s)
Was that the mystery biscuits button?
Oh yeah
This designing for critical systems reminds me of Ecological Interface Design which I recently worked on. It's meant for exactly this kind of situation, but does it the other way around from what people usually do (and what the expert describes in the video): Instead of creating a blacklist of possible problems (if A, B or C goes wrong, we have a problem), you define a whitelist (only if D, E and F are true is the system working correctly). That way, you also catch problems that no one anticipated while building the system.
**cue ecstatic laughter**
cool edit with the timer ;)
I wish it went off at the exact moment the timer hit 0.
Absolutely right. In the software industry, we learn to automate deployments because saying “a developer hit the wrong button” is like saying a pilot hit the wrong button and killed hundreds
It was kind of anticlimactic on video.
I thought the timer was a trick, to bait us into something we don't expect.
Oh boy, do I look dumb.
probably why they usually spread them out over several minutes.
You deceptive bugger
Awesome. My favourite fireworks booboo, has to be called something like Big Bay Boom, or Bang. I think in San Diego on a barge just off shore. It is unreal! I love how the spectators go from, wonder to worry in a few seconds.
This by far was the most iconic, probably the most hilarious thing to happen in San Diego history
congrats on 1 million subs
One continuous still shot of the fireworks from a hard camera would have been better.
Adrian Ridgway Totally agree, they gave you a full shot of the people but not the fireworks, the reason for the video.
@@DavidCruickshank no its not
The ending is a literal display of boys and their explosive toys. Amazing. Wish I was there to see that!
I know everyone is going on about the spectacle of the fireworks, but thank you for raising the points of systemic failure vs individual error. It's something which I wish more people took notice of
I think it's time to explain how big red buttons work...
...or, rather, don't.
They make shitty sonic games.
This happened in San Diego on a much bigger scale. It sounds cool in theory, but they all go off at once and you just get a big flash of light and can't really see anything. Not too exciting.
And the packing days, you'll be able to see again after three days
I remember that! We got quite a chuckle out of it (though I’m sure there were some folks who weren’t laughing).
"The professionals over there"
ummm... just for a moment it looked as though Matt was pressing the buttons :D
One..Fi-BOOOOOOM
Reminds me of Komodo 3000
Dammit, got here before me!
Osama Rao me too!
When will my eyesight return? "In about 3 weeks." Totaly worth it.
MITM nioceeeeeeee
I've done a fireworks show with a friend who is in the business. there is no better view than what the technicians get from underneath, truly spectacular.
Pure, unadaulterated joy. I'm so glad you included your reactions, they were even more satisfying to watch than the fireworks. That laugh really gives you a sense of what one must've felt to actually witness it in person. Love it!
It's like that scene in Malcolm in the Middle where they set off a firework so huge it just becomes daytime for a few seconds and they're blind for two days.
Great video Tom!
3:04 What's That Sound?
3:12 Signs!
3:19 What's So Funny?
3:27 Cafe Blue
3:30 Stormy Weather
Great episode. I love how you can do something like "very large explosion' and put some real valuable information in there as well.
To be honest, I half expected "Mystery Biscuits" to play when you hit the button.
the sheer amount of joy you guys have on your faces. wonderful.
Hey, congratulations on passing 1 million subscribers. Literally setting off ten minutes of fireworks in a matter of seconds is a fine way to celebrate.
And never mentioning anything to do with subscribers in the video itself is classy.
An “Unintentional Additional Procedural Step”. I’m having that!
Can also be shortened to UAPS, pronounced “Woops” 😄
Perfect line, isn't it?
Fabulous video I work for a minor league baseball team in the US. This team has about 15 post game firework shows per year. From that I have learned a bit about the behind the scenes of the shows. This video helped fill in the gaps.
The laughter at the end was so pure and full of joy
I can imagine how that would have felt in their chests. I love the physical boom sensation during fireworks, having them all go off at once must have been amazing.
"This isn't just about fireworks." You should have mentioned the nuclear missile "this is not a drill" warning from Hawaii last month. :)
I was at Epcot several years ago on Independence Day. Supposedly, the engineers had scoured the warehouses looking for every shell that was left over from other shows, things that were otherwise just collecting dust.
And they put them into the finale of Illuminations: Reflections of Earth.
When the time came, the result was almost exactly what appears in this video... Except it lasted for several continuous minutes. It looked like daylight with a steady rumble.
Nothing quite like Tom's candid excitement.
When I was a kid, all families on the block would chip in to buy fireworks and then we'd all go to a vacant lot and the dads would set them off. When I was very small, there was a firework spinning around, attached to a telephone pole, a Catherine wheel (?). The problem was that it wasn't attached very well. So it spun off the pole and into the box with all the rest of the fireworks. Kids cheered, mothers screamed add grabbed kids and ran away as fast as they could and we had the greatest but shortest fireworks the neighborhood had ever seen. I think that was the last time we had a neighborhood fireworks show.
That made me way more giddy than I was expecting. Also love the Bes Isis cameo at the end on the left there.
"AWESOME!"
Yup that´s Matt. 10/10 would recognize again xD
*"Unintentional additional procedural step"* is my new favourite thing to say when messing something up
I wish more engineers understood this. If it's designed so it's possible to make a mistake, then people will make that mistake. The fact that 'go' and 'stop' in a car are both pedals on the floor that you push, and if you mix them up, someone dies has always shitted me to tears. But there are examples everywhere. I flew a helicopter that some genius had designed with two knobs on the dash. Pull one and the cabin got warm (heater control) pull the other and the cabin got quiet (fuel control). That's right, you could accidentally turn off the engine in a helicopter trying to turn on the heater. It was also designed so that when the passenger got out they would slide over the throttle and apply full throttle (predictably bad thing as you're trying to maintain a low hover).
i love that i could easily pick out Matt’s laughter in the crowd.
i dont know what it is about fireworks, i just cant get enough of them! whenever there is something exploding, i need to see it! 😄probably should have created a channel where i blow things up instead of the content i create now 😉
Well done to who ever did the editing, can hardly see the fireworks with all those cuts and zome. Brilliant.
That's spectacular. Great topic to investigate a bit more, too, as I've always wondered why something as potentially dangerous and therefore redundantly safeguarded as the pyrotechnics industry (having trained in it myself) ever has *any* misfires/accidents. As you pointed out, modern systems have multiple points of failure checking, so when you hear of these 'human error' moments it's often even more bamboozling as to how something could possibly go wrong.
Imagine that being seen from space!
I was expecting Mystery Biscuits when Tom hit the button
This is scary how much I sit down and think of this applying to my own job... so many cues to hit and so many things that can go wrong
I love matt's "AWWWWWESOOOOMMMMEEE" I want that as a soundbyte
An old adage: "Engineers are in a race with the Universe, trying to come up with tools that are more and more foolproof, while the Universe is producing bigger and bigger fools. So far, the Universe is winning."
So, while I applaud the effort and appreciate the sentiment, the goal of eradicating human error can only be the negative implication of a mathematical limit: No matter how close you get, so long as you're restricted to the finite world, you can't get there.
Ah, Tom! You bring me such joy! Thank you xxx
I like it how you did it with the people who do the New Year’s Eve fireworks at the London eye
I was kind of expecting more. I guess it's a " you had to be there" moment.
I think you can really get it if you look at the background when they show the shot from the alternate perspective. The whole scene is lit brighter than day.
It's funny, you can see everyone enjoys it in the reaction shot, but you really see the guys turn into kids.
My Brain: "It's just a little fart, no-one will notice..."
The Fart: 3:11
Was interesting getting to hear about how these guys handle the setup, and there's a good point about safe design here, too.
I certainly loved more the reaction from you guys!
Even though the red button doesn't do anything, yes, the red button is pressed and the fireworks actually launched after that when the timer runs out.
fancy seeing you here, mr. black midi guy person
That was impressive, the thought of human errors causing disasters. This is why I love this channel. Thought provoking sophisticated stuff simply explained
I don't think I have ever seen Tom so happy.
That expression at the end was just contagious =]
Dude, Make a 30min +ep. series. Something to watch whilst eating
I once heard a production manager scold an employee for sending out a part that was not yet ready for the customer. I remember hearing him responding with the very reasonable argument that delivering a part worth tens of thousands of dollars should not come down to one person. Rather, a system should have been in place that was clearly set up to prevent what had been a very common problem at that company. His words fell on deaf ears, and he eventually left the company. I learned a lot of useful information at that company. Largely from the mistakes they refused to avoid.
Tom scott is one of the few people I watch using a satellite connection. Not the cheapest way to watch the video, but I am dedicated Xd
Matt's facial expression captures the moment beautifully.
An unintentional procedural step. I love it.
For the record, totally saw the false button coming. Very funny. Love your vids Tom!
Legend has it they are still laughing at all the fireworks.
I love surprised and amazed expressions on your faces.
Awesome!
Ha! Love the dummy button - I was on the edge of my seat!
This video inspired me to explore about fireworks
Thanks Tom !
My uncle used to do this, before his friend died in an accident and he decided to teach fireworks safety. I used to have a hard time understanding that decision, cause I don't think I quite understood how dangerous his job was - I just thought it looked fun.
What's that noise during the final countdown? It sounds like a spaceship about to jump to lightspeed!
Never new a fireworks display was such an engineering endeavor, very interesting
The editing on this one must have been hard, but also super fun. Very cool Tom, you continue to push it forward.
Normally, what I find to be one of the best parts of a professional fireworks display is when you're close enough to FEEL the sound of the fireworks exploding, but far away enough for there to be a delay. That feeling is lost entirely when just watching on a UA-cam video. It also didn't look as big as I expected.
Tom Scott, did your entire body reverberate when they went off?
THIS IS THE CONTENT I’M HERE FOR! ✨
I didn't realize that the Mystery Biscuits button also launches fireworks!