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Fault tree analysis
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Fault tree analysis
Fault tree analysis (FTA) is a type of failure analysis in which an undesired state of a system is examined. This analysis method is mainly used in safety engineering and reliability engineering to understand how systems can fail, to identify the best ways to reduce risk and to determine (or get a feeling for) event rates of a safety accident or a particular system level (functional) failure. FTA is used in the aerospace, nuclear power, chemical and process, pharmaceutical, petrochemical and other high-hazard industries; but is also used in fields as diverse as risk factor identification relating to social service system failure. FTA is also used in software engineering for debugging purposes and is closely related to cause-elimination technique used to detect bugs.
In aerospace, the more general term "system failure condition" is used for the "undesired state" / top event of the fault tree. These conditions are classified by the severity of their effects. The most severe conditions require the most extensive fault tree analysis. These system failure conditions and their classification are often previously determined in the functional hazard analysis.
Fault tree analysis can be used to:
Fault tree analysis (FTA) was originally developed in 1962 at Bell Laboratories by H.A. Watson, under a U.S. Air Force Ballistics Systems Division contract to evaluate the Minuteman I Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) Launch Control System. The use of fault trees has since gained widespread support and is often used as a failure analysis tool by reliability experts. Following the first published use of FTA in the 1962 Minuteman I Launch Control Safety Study, Boeing and AVCO expanded use of FTA to the entire Minuteman II system in 1963–1964. FTA received extensive coverage at a 1965 System Safety Symposium in Seattle sponsored by Boeing and the University of Washington. Boeing began using FTA for civil aircraft design around 1966.
Subsequently, within the U.S. military, application of FTA for use with fuses was explored by Picatinny Arsenal in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1976 the U.S. Army Materiel Command incorporated FTA into an Engineering Design Handbook on Design for Reliability. The Reliability Analysis Center at Rome Laboratory and its successor organizations now with the Defense Technical Information Center (Reliability Information Analysis Center, and now Defense Systems Information Analysis Center) has published documents on FTA and reliability block diagrams since the 1960s. MIL-HDBK-338B provides a more recent reference.
In 1970, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) published a change to 14 CFR 25.1309 airworthiness regulations for transport category aircraft in the Federal Register at 35 FR 5665 (1970-04-08). This change adopted failure probability criteria for aircraft systems and equipment and led to widespread use of FTA in civil aviation. In 1998, the FAA published Order 8040.4, establishing risk management policy including hazard analysis in a range of critical activities beyond aircraft certification, including air traffic control and modernization of the U.S. National Airspace System. This led to the publication of the FAA System Safety Handbook, which describes the use of FTA in various types of formal hazard analysis.
Early in the Apollo program the question was asked about the probability of successfully sending astronauts to the moon and returning them safely to Earth. A risk, or reliability, calculation of some sort was performed and the result was a mission success probability that was unacceptably low. This result discouraged NASA from further quantitative risk or reliability analysis until after the Challenger accident in 1986. Instead, NASA decided to rely on the use of failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA) and other qualitative methods for system safety assessments. After the Challenger accident, the importance of probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) and FTA in systems risk and reliability analysis was realized and its use at NASA has begun to grow and now FTA is considered as one of the most important system reliability and safety analysis techniques.
Within the nuclear power industry, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission began using PRA methods including FTA in 1975, and significantly expanded PRA research following the 1979 incident at Three Mile Island. This eventually led to the 1981 publication of the NRC Fault Tree Handbook NUREG–0492, and mandatory use of PRA under the NRC's regulatory authority.
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Fault tree analysis
Fault tree analysis (FTA) is a type of failure analysis in which an undesired state of a system is examined. This analysis method is mainly used in safety engineering and reliability engineering to understand how systems can fail, to identify the best ways to reduce risk and to determine (or get a feeling for) event rates of a safety accident or a particular system level (functional) failure. FTA is used in the aerospace, nuclear power, chemical and process, pharmaceutical, petrochemical and other high-hazard industries; but is also used in fields as diverse as risk factor identification relating to social service system failure. FTA is also used in software engineering for debugging purposes and is closely related to cause-elimination technique used to detect bugs.
In aerospace, the more general term "system failure condition" is used for the "undesired state" / top event of the fault tree. These conditions are classified by the severity of their effects. The most severe conditions require the most extensive fault tree analysis. These system failure conditions and their classification are often previously determined in the functional hazard analysis.
Fault tree analysis can be used to:
Fault tree analysis (FTA) was originally developed in 1962 at Bell Laboratories by H.A. Watson, under a U.S. Air Force Ballistics Systems Division contract to evaluate the Minuteman I Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) Launch Control System. The use of fault trees has since gained widespread support and is often used as a failure analysis tool by reliability experts. Following the first published use of FTA in the 1962 Minuteman I Launch Control Safety Study, Boeing and AVCO expanded use of FTA to the entire Minuteman II system in 1963–1964. FTA received extensive coverage at a 1965 System Safety Symposium in Seattle sponsored by Boeing and the University of Washington. Boeing began using FTA for civil aircraft design around 1966.
Subsequently, within the U.S. military, application of FTA for use with fuses was explored by Picatinny Arsenal in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1976 the U.S. Army Materiel Command incorporated FTA into an Engineering Design Handbook on Design for Reliability. The Reliability Analysis Center at Rome Laboratory and its successor organizations now with the Defense Technical Information Center (Reliability Information Analysis Center, and now Defense Systems Information Analysis Center) has published documents on FTA and reliability block diagrams since the 1960s. MIL-HDBK-338B provides a more recent reference.
In 1970, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) published a change to 14 CFR 25.1309 airworthiness regulations for transport category aircraft in the Federal Register at 35 FR 5665 (1970-04-08). This change adopted failure probability criteria for aircraft systems and equipment and led to widespread use of FTA in civil aviation. In 1998, the FAA published Order 8040.4, establishing risk management policy including hazard analysis in a range of critical activities beyond aircraft certification, including air traffic control and modernization of the U.S. National Airspace System. This led to the publication of the FAA System Safety Handbook, which describes the use of FTA in various types of formal hazard analysis.
Early in the Apollo program the question was asked about the probability of successfully sending astronauts to the moon and returning them safely to Earth. A risk, or reliability, calculation of some sort was performed and the result was a mission success probability that was unacceptably low. This result discouraged NASA from further quantitative risk or reliability analysis until after the Challenger accident in 1986. Instead, NASA decided to rely on the use of failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA) and other qualitative methods for system safety assessments. After the Challenger accident, the importance of probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) and FTA in systems risk and reliability analysis was realized and its use at NASA has begun to grow and now FTA is considered as one of the most important system reliability and safety analysis techniques.
Within the nuclear power industry, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission began using PRA methods including FTA in 1975, and significantly expanded PRA research following the 1979 incident at Three Mile Island. This eventually led to the 1981 publication of the NRC Fault Tree Handbook NUREG–0492, and mandatory use of PRA under the NRC's regulatory authority.
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