HAZARD ANALYSIS

What Is It

A hazard analysis is a tabular inventory of nontrivial system hazards and a qualitative assessment of them after countermeasures have been imposed. It identifies and examines conditions that pose a threat of loss or harm to personnel and/or equipment. Often included is a tabular listing of the countermeasures with a delineation of their effectiveness. It is an early or initial safety study of risks based on existing system hazards.

When To Use

Use hazard analysis

• At any point in the life cycle of the project.
• To delineate (significant) risks based on an existing hazard associated with a specific system, along with the attributes.
• To provide management information to make decisions to allocate resources and prioritize activities to bring risks within acceptable limits.

Benefits

This method

• Helps to answer the question what can go wrong?
• Provides an inventory of hazards, existing or unforeseen, in a system, facility, or activity.
• Assesses the hazard risk subjectively by likelihood and severity.
• Results in risk mitigation by reduction of the hazard.
• Provides a logically based evaluation of a system's weak points early enough to allow design mitigation of risk rather than a procedural or inspection level approach.