Document Type
Conference Paper Restricted
Conference Name
6th Resilience Engineering Association's International Symposium
Conference Location
Lisbon
Publication Date
2015
Abstract
The maritime industry is still characterized by prescriptive standards and reactive approaches in relation to safety and risk management to a large extent. For a very long time, responses to maritime accidents have been in terms of automation, regulation and training. While this as such is not wrong, it does not offer the full potential that concepts of resilience seem to suggest. The typical question that is predominately asked is still why things go wrong when accidents occur and search for causes and explanations is undertaken. An evaluation of the safety level achieved system and a focus on system components and characteristics that help the system to usually perform safe is typically not part of the investigation. This creates a need to review the current ideas about safety regulations and risk management in the maritime industry as they have probably reached a limit of what they were able to achieve. The concept of resilience engineering with its focus on system performance rather that system failure is a promising concept to be considered in the shipping business, but needs further investigation.