This Day in Failure: November 15

2009: Tennessee Titans owner Bud Adams, 86, shows his raised middle fingers to Buffalo Bills fans during the waning moments of his team’s 41-17 win over the Bills at LP Field in Nashville. The NFL fines Adams a quarter-million dollars for the gestures. A week later Adams takes out a full page ad in the Buffalo News, wishing the Bills and their fans good luck for the remainder of the season.

2003: At a shipyard at St. Nazaire, France, 15 people are killed and more than 30 are injured when a gangway leading to the luxury liner Queen Mary 2 collapses, causing the victims to plunge 50 feet onto a cement platform.

1990: Frank Farian, producer of rock duo Milli Vanilli, announces that Fabrice Morvan and Rob Pilatus never sang a note on the group’s debut album (Milli Vanilli) and that they lip-synched when performing live.

1978: An Icelandic Airlines DC-8 carrying Muslim pilgrims from Mecca to Indonesia crashes upon approach to Colombo Airport in Katunayake, Sri Lanka, killing 175 passengers and eight crew members. The accident is attributed to the pilots’ failure to monitor the plane’s so-called sink rate upon descent, a mistake compounded by the fact that the plane’s altimeter had been incorrectly set to make a safety alert at 150 feet instead of 250 feet.