Investigation method for cascading effects between critical infrastructures

This paper presents an investigation method for studying cascading effects in incidents, which is to some extent lacking in the scientific literature. Several incident investigation methods are reviewed and used to influence the presented method. The usefulness of the method is demonstrated in a case study for a recent event in Sweden, a severe flooding event in the city of Malmö in south of Sweden 31st of August 2014. The case study revealed that the method enables the gathering and structuring of information about cascading effects and conditions that affect the outcome of cascading effects. An advantage of the method is that it also captures aggravating or mitigating conditions as well as potential cascading effects, enabling the study of near misses and alternative scenario developments. Concluding that the method has proven its practical value and it fills a current gap when it comes to investigation methods focused on cascading effects