Managing Major Disruptions in Critical Infrastructures: Resilience-based Approaches

The evolution of Critical Infrastructures (CIs) is enabling society to improve our quality of life, and thereby, we are increasingly relying on them. Major disruptions occurred dur-ing the lasts few years to CIs led society to have higher awareness of the need of an effi-cient protection. However, the increasing complexity and interconnectedness of CIs makes it very difficult to protect them from major disruptions. This project investigates which are the classical methods of emergency management, their limitations and how dealing with crisis can be improved by implementing resilience, particularly for unforeseen events. Moreover, the main characteristics of Resilient Organ-isations are described, and how they can prevent, absorb and recover major disruptions in Critical Infrastructures. We analyse the Farris-Sommersted incident, which major disrup-tion affected the rail freight sector considerably. To do that, we interview three key decision makers from the biggest companies affected by the disruption, Banedanmark and DB Schenker. Based on the information provided by the interviewees, we identify the main resilient features that both companies have. We observe that good communication within the company and with stakeholders, and organ-isational learning are key aspects to continuously enhance resilience in organisations. Moreover, we conclude that while private companies may need resilience to take ad-vantage from their competitors, public organisations should guarantee resilience for the good of society.