Sensemaking and resilience in safety-critical situations: a literature review

Abstract

Recent accidents and near-accidents, such as the capsizing of the anchor handling vessel Bourbon Dolphin in 2007 and the unintended list of the drilling rig Scarabeo 8 in 2012, underline the need for addressing sensemaking in safety-critical situations within the maritime domain. This paper is a literature review to answer the research question: What are the characteristics of sensemaking and resilience in safety-critical situations? The aim was to establish more knowledge on sensemaking in safety-critical situations and the relationship be-tween sensemaking and resilience. The majority of authors provide definitions based on Weick's work on sense-making, describing sensemaking as a social process, involving the extracting of cues and enactment to create meaning to events retrospectively. Few authors provide descriptions that characterise sensemaking in safety-critical situations. There is a lack of literature regarding sensemaking in safety-critical situations in the maritime domain that addresses the issues of training and human-machine interactions.