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[Daniel Pitts]

I'd be interested in a reference for that. Can you remember where you
read it?
Thanks Phil

I believe I read it in Java Concurrency in Practice.

Practicing some advanced Google-Fu, I found this:
From <http://www.embedded-computing.com/news/db/?9717> > Race condition
defects have been responsible for some of the most notorious failures in
software. For example, race conditions in the software of the Therac-25
radiation ther-apy machine were cited as contributing to the death of
five patients.

Which lead me to the Wikipedia artical about the Therac itself.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25>

 

[Daniel Pitts]

The original article describing the details of the case was published in
the IEEE publication /Computer/ in the early 90s, IIRC. (The article is
referenced from the Wikipedia link.) It was written in a dry,
dispassionate and objective style that made the account all the more
chilling for its refusal to sensationalize.

The manufacturer didn't start claiming that it fixed the problem until
enough people found out that there was a problem; originally they
suppressed the information. Once they were called to account, they were
fond of rapidly responding with bizarre claims like "reliability has
been improved 5000%". Aside from the meaninglessness of such statements
absent any baseline measurement of "reliability", it is clear the
manufacturer actually did nothing to solve the problem except try to
hide it and let people die.

Sounds like the Tobacco companies et al.