Abnormal Situations Don’t Fail One System—They Fail the System
with Angela Summers
Free
Most process safety incidents don’t occur because a single system fails—they occur because the process, control system, alarms, operator, and protection layers fail together. The problem is not a lack of safeguards. It is that their performance as an integrated system is rarely verified under realistic conditions.
Dynamic simulation changes that. By recreating how the process evolves over time while executing real control logic, alarm configuration, operator interfaces, and protective functions, simulation exposes how disturbances actually develop—and whether the system stabilizes or escalates.
This webinar shows how dynamic simulation can be used to evaluate abnormal situation response as a time-dependent, integrated problem. It highlights where performance breaks down: interacting control loops, alarm floods that obscure the initiating cause, delayed operator response, and protection layers that act too late or on the wrong variable.
The result is not theoretical insight—it is actionable verification. Engineers can confirm whether the operator can respond in time, whether alarms support diagnosis, and whether protective functions achieve the required safe state.
If you assume your system will respond correctly, this session will challenge that assumption.
