Red Beads sank the Titanic

Red Beads crept into the raw materials of the White bead company because of cost cutting by the management team - procurement were given a target to reduce materials costs by 20%, which they achieved quite easily by demanding a price cut from suppliers.
But of course this move was made by silo thinkers, not systems thinkers - as the overall effect on the wider system was disastrous, the company lost customers and workers lost their jobs.

A new study by scientists (Guardian 16th April 2008) suggests that the root cause of the sinking of the Titanic might have been "second rate rivets". Apparently Harland and Woolf was under pressure to obtain enough iron to make 3 millions rivets to hold the ship toghether. There was a rush to beat competition from Cunard, and the upshot was a vessel made using substandard materials. The authors claim that "a shortage of available top-quality iron and of the skills to make the rivets came to a head at precisely the time of the Titanic's construction. The board was in crisis mode.....In every meeting people would say "There are problems with the rivets and we need to hire more people". They contend that the shipyard dealt with the shortages by using a grade down from the best-quality iron.

When the Titanic struck the iceberg, by design it should have stayed afloat. But so many of the rivets popped along the starboard side of the ship that too many of the sealed compartments flooded leading to more than 1500 deaths.