Usability of accident and incident reports for evidence-based risk modeling - A case study on ship grounding reports

This paper presents study of 115 grounding accident reports from the Safety Investigation Authority of Finland and Marine Accident Investigation Branch of the UK, as well as 163 near-miss grounding reports from ForeSea and Finnpilot incident databases. The objective was to find the type of knowledge that can be extracted from such sources and discuss the usability of accident and incident reports for evidence-based risk modeling. A new version of Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) is introduced as a framework to review the accident reports. The new positive taxonomy as Safety Factors, which are based on high level positive functions that are prerequisite for safe transport operations, is used for reviewing the incident reports. Accident reports are shown as a reliable source of evidence to extract the most significant contributing factors in the events. Mandatory incident reports are considered useful for understanding the effective barriers as risk control measures. Voluntary incident reports, though, are seen as not very reliable in their current form to be used for evidence-based risk modeling.