34
Sensemaking in Safety Critical and Complex Situations
an e asy- to-use roadmap for screening and identifying safety critical tasks based on
their level of criticality.
BACKGROUND
Despite continuous work and advancements in risk management, major accidents
keep occurring, with the Macondo blowout’s 10-year anniversary being a chilling
reminder ( U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, 2016). While the
systemic causation of major accidents will be forever m ind-boggling, disasters like
the Macondo blowout inevitably happen in the wake of increased complexity introduced by concurrent technological and operational developments. For the petroleum
industry, which is in this chapter’s focus, wells are being drilled longer in deeper
waters and in harsher environments.
To cope with the continuously changing risk picture, both the regulatory bodies and the industry actors develop their risk management frameworks, models and
requirements to stay within acceptable limits of what is considered safe. One of these
developments consists of more systematic considerations of how human performance
contributes to major accident risk. For example, the United Kingdom’s ( UK) Health
and Safety Executive promotes analysis and management of human failures when
performing safety critical tasks ( Health and Safety Executive, 2016). Similarly, the
Norwegian Petroleum Safety Authorities ( PSA) requires operational barrier elements,
a sub-type of safety critical tasks, to be managed according to the same requirements
as technical barrier elements ( PSA, 2017). Furthermore, the use of human reliability
assessments to study safety critical tasks as an integrated part of quantitative risk
analysis ( QRA) was made increasingly feasible with the launch of the P etro-HRA
method in 2017 ( Bye et al., 2017). Petro-HRA is the first HRA method specifically
tailored to meet the needs of human error quantification performed as part of QRAs
in the petroleum industry. It was developed based on SPAR-H method ( Gertman
et al., 2005), an HRA technique also promoted by NOPSEMA, the Australian regulator of petroleum activities ( 2020). Several publications ( e.g. Bridges, 2011; Myers,
2013) also indicate that HRA is becoming increasingly used as part of Layers of
Protection Analysis ( LOPA), a risk analysis technique commonly used under the
Functional Safety regime ( Center for Chemical Process Safety, 2015).
A challenge frequently encountered by practitioners working with analysis and
management of safety critical tasks is how to identify and select which tasks to
devote the most attention and resources. Such devotion commonly consists of more
in-depth analysis of factors influencing human performance ( including errors) or
development and use of procedures, training or workplace design. Often faced with
limitations in both money and time, how to prioritize the correct tasks therefore
becomes an important part of the work. Several pitfalls may present itself as part
of this process. Due to the inherent complexity and often large scale of the systems
being addressed, the list of what can be considered safety critical tasks may grow
to become excessively long. This is the most apparent pitfall and implies a possibility that more critical tasks receive too little attention, relatively, compared to less
critical tasks. Alternatively, tasks may be incorrectly labelled as having low criticality and consequently screened out during the selection process. This could happen
Sensemaking in Safety Critical and Complex Situations
an e asy- to-use roadmap for screening and identifying safety critical tasks based on
their level of criticality.
BACKGROUND
Despite continuous work and advancements in risk management, major accidents
keep occurring, with the Macondo blowout’s 10-year anniversary being a chilling
reminder ( U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, 2016). While the
systemic causation of major accidents will be forever m ind-boggling, disasters like
the Macondo blowout inevitably happen in the wake of increased complexity introduced by concurrent technological and operational developments. For the petroleum
industry, which is in this chapter’s focus, wells are being drilled longer in deeper
waters and in harsher environments.
To cope with the continuously changing risk picture, both the regulatory bodies and the industry actors develop their risk management frameworks, models and
requirements to stay within acceptable limits of what is considered safe. One of these
developments consists of more systematic considerations of how human performance
contributes to major accident risk. For example, the United Kingdom’s ( UK) Health
and Safety Executive promotes analysis and management of human failures when
performing safety critical tasks ( Health and Safety Executive, 2016). Similarly, the
Norwegian Petroleum Safety Authorities ( PSA) requires operational barrier elements,
a sub-type of safety critical tasks, to be managed according to the same requirements
as technical barrier elements ( PSA, 2017). Furthermore, the use of human reliability
assessments to study safety critical tasks as an integrated part of quantitative risk
analysis ( QRA) was made increasingly feasible with the launch of the P etro-HRA
method in 2017 ( Bye et al., 2017). Petro-HRA is the first HRA method specifically
tailored to meet the needs of human error quantification performed as part of QRAs
in the petroleum industry. It was developed based on SPAR-H method ( Gertman
et al., 2005), an HRA technique also promoted by NOPSEMA, the Australian regulator of petroleum activities ( 2020). Several publications ( e.g. Bridges, 2011; Myers,
2013) also indicate that HRA is becoming increasingly used as part of Layers of
Protection Analysis ( LOPA), a risk analysis technique commonly used under the
Functional Safety regime ( Center for Chemical Process Safety, 2015).
A challenge frequently encountered by practitioners working with analysis and
management of safety critical tasks is how to identify and select which tasks to
devote the most attention and resources. Such devotion commonly consists of more
in-depth analysis of factors influencing human performance ( including errors) or
development and use of procedures, training or workplace design. Often faced with
limitations in both money and time, how to prioritize the correct tasks therefore
becomes an important part of the work. Several pitfalls may present itself as part
of this process. Due to the inherent complexity and often large scale of the systems
being addressed, the list of what can be considered safety critical tasks may grow
to become excessively long. This is the most apparent pitfall and implies a possibility that more critical tasks receive too little attention, relatively, compared to less
critical tasks. Alternatively, tasks may be incorrectly labelled as having low criticality and consequently screened out during the selection process. This could happen