A system accident is an "unanticipated interaction of multiple failures" in a complex system. This complexity can either be technological or organizational, and often is both.

A system accident can be very easy to see in hindsight, but very difficult to see in foresight. Ahead of time, there are simply too many possible action pathways to seriously consider all of them.

These accidents often resemble Rube Goldberg devices in the way that small errors of judgment, flaws in technology, and insignificant damages combine to form an emergent disaster. System accidents were described in 1984 by Charles Perrow, who termed them "normal accidents", as having two main characteristics: interactive complexity and tight coupling. James T. Reason extended this approach with human reliability and the Swiss cheese model, now widely accepted in aviation safety and healthcare.

Once an enterprise passes a certain point in size, with many employees, specialization, backup systems, double-checking, detailed manuals, and formal communication, employees can all too easily recourse to protocol, habit, and "being right." Rather like attempting to watch a complicated movie in a language one is unfamiliar with, the narrative thread of what is going on can be lost. And other phenomena, such as groupthink, can also be occurring at the same time, for real-world accidents of course almost always have multiple causes, and not just the single cause that could have prevented the accident at the very last minute. In particular, it is a mark of a dysfunctional organization to simply blame the last person who touched something.

Walter Elias "Walt" Disney (December 5, 1901 – December 15, 1966) was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O. Disney, he was co-founder of Walt Disney Productions, which later became one of the best-known motion picture producers in the world. The corporation is now known as The Walt Disney Company and had an annual revenue of approximately US$36 billion in the 2010 financial year.

Disney is particularly noted as a film producer and a popular showman, as well as an innovator in animation and theme park design. He and his staff created some of the world's most well-known fictional characters including Mickey Mouse, for whom Disney himself provided the original voice. During his lifetime he received four honorary Academy Awards and won 22 Academy Awards from a total of 59 nominations, including a record four in one year, giving him more awards and nominations than any other individual in history. Disney also won seven Emmy Awards and gave his name to the Disneyland and Walt Disney World Resort theme parks in the U.S., as well as the international resorts Tokyo Disney Resort, Disneyland Paris, and Hong Kong Disneyland.