Goal:Obscure both facts and the central recommendation/message in an emergency that directly threatens

National prestige

Personal career prospects

7 human lives

Technique:Use PowerPointtext badly

Imprecision, impausibility & unreliabilityBad typography

This is the main slide, in a set of 13, with which Boeing engineers presented their conclusions -about the probable damage to Columbia - to their superiors

Technique:Use PowerPoint text badly CAIB Report on the Columbia Disaster 2003

Imprecision, impausibility & unreliabilityBad typography

It has five logical levels and size of indent ...

Technique:Use PowerPoint text badly CAIB Report on the Columbia Disaster 2003

Imprecision, impausibility & unreliabilityBad typography

1

2

3

45

... five type size and bold/standard type face combinations ...

... and the crucial message is hidden behind two obscure numbers on the last line and in the second smallest type size used on the slide

Technique:Use PowerPointbadly CAIB Report on the Columbia Disaster 2003

Imprecision, impausibility & unreliabilityBad typography

The damage to Columbia is probably 640 times worse than anything we have ever even modelled (so prepare Atlantis for rescue mission asap)

What needed to be said, was pretty straightforward