I'll go first.

In the early 2Ks the Houston Came3rqa Show was still a viable but shrinking venue for photo gear . . .and a great three day experience. On separate occasions I picked up, first a sweet Zone VI. A jewel compared to my all grey B&J clujnker. At another show I picked up a lightweight carbon tripod with a magnesium ball head.

This was a nice kit; convenient and light weight and all of it worked well together. A few years later we went to Galveston for a day of long walks on the beach, picking up shellsd and so on. Set up the Zone VI for an interesting composition of ripples, shell and a bit of weed .b . .something like that. Angled the camera steeply down for an overhead view with my head deeply into the focusing hood, settled on just the right framing and tightened down on the bullhead to freeze everything.

There was a snap or pop and I scrambled to hold on to the camera and a big 90mm Nikkor while everything else fell away from my grasping other hand!

Got it all stabilized; camera and lens stowed in the bag, and evaluated the event. Tripod seemed OK, but the ball head had come apart in four large pieces and a few bits. Turns out the single shaft that holds the two clamshell halves around the base and ball had broken deep inside the assembly. Had I not been actually cradling the camera bed in my left hand when it failed, the whole thing would have planted the lens right into the sand and shells.