Since 2016, 25% of accidents in ICPEs (classified facilities for environmental protection requiring authorisation or registration), impacting people and property, have been caused by multiple failures involving equipment faults or human interventions. Most initial post-accident verifications focus on the incriminated system: did it function as intended and were the necessary human actions taken? One failure is already one too many; this is all the more true for multiple failures. It is therefore important to know how to analyse cases of multiple failures accurately and with all the requisite objectivity, as this will guide investigations into the nature of their root causes: were there common modes? were there generic failures? were there failures specific to an isolated system that was insufficiently analysed? were there deeper failures caused by organisational methods? All these clues provide the information needed to help explain the causes of multiple failures and prevent them from recurring

• Fact sheet “Multiple failures”