ENGG4020/7020 - Systems Safety Engineering

Semester 2, 2011

Course coordinator:                                                                        Assignment results

Dr Graeme Smith
Office: 78-315
Phone: 3365 1625
Email: smith@itee.uq.edu.au

Timetable:

Lectures     Thursday    10.00am - 11.50am                        Gordon Greenwood Building (32-211)

Tutorials     Thursday    2.00pm - 3.50pm  (even-numbered weeks only)          GP South (78-224)  

                     or

                    Friday       12.00pm - 1.50pm  (even-numbered weeks only)         GP South (78-343)         

Course outline:

Safety is a whole life cycle issue that relates to all aspects of the system. Hardware, software, operating procedures, planning, development, testing, maintenance, installation, commissioning, decommissioning, disposal and other aspects are considered in a safety program.

For most safety-critical systems, it is insufficient to develop a safe system, and the system must be shown to be acceptably safe. The acceptance of a safety case forms an important part of such a product. Early identification of safety issues and assessment of the safety-criticality of a system are valuable in preventing costly mitigations and rework being used to produce an acceptably safe product. A number of disasters have shown that for many organisations, the entire process of analysing, specifying, developing and deploying safety-critical systems needs improvement.

The lecture component of this course explains the principles and practice of safety management and engineering and the unique challenges of computer-based systems. The content blends discussion of management and development issues with practical experience in safety analysis techniques. Topics covered include: hazard identification and risk analysis, safe system design, safety analysis techniques, safe software engineering, system hazard analysis, safety cases, safety management and human factors. Techniques covered include: Hazard and Operability Studies (HAZOP) and Computer Hazard and Operability Studies (CHAZOP), Fault Tree Analysis (FTA), Event Tree Analysis (ETA), Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) and Failure Modes Effects and Criticality Analysis (FMECA), and Goal Structured Notation (GSN).

While the focus is on safety, most of the material applies very well to other dimensions of risk (such as security, financial risk, environmental risk). The course is thus a good primer for anyone interested in risk assessment and risk management for socio-technical systems.