Cracking the Reason for Business Interruption:
Safeguarding Operational Resilience
Forensic engineering · Data centres & critical facilities
Mission-critical power, cooling and controls specialists, investigating the failures where every minute is a loss.
At Mission Critical Forensics, we specialize in forensic analysis for data centre failures and other mission-critical operations. Our approach was forged in environments where failure is not an option. Our team is led by a principal engineer who has taught and examined the principles of data centre design and operation for a leading international authority on data centre standards, and we bring that systemic rigour to every investigation. We look beyond the initial point of failure to identify latent vulnerabilities, delivering definitive, data-driven conclusions that insurers, counsel and courts can rely on, whether the matter is a claim, a subrogation or a dispute.
A data centre outage is rarely one failure. Redundant power and cooling are designed so that no single fault takes the facility down; when it goes down anyway, the cause usually lies in how several things failed together: a component, a transfer, a control sequence, a setting, a maintenance practice. Our investigations establish that sequence and the business interruption that followed.
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Mission-critical specialists
Power, cooling and controls, together
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Systemic
The whole facility, not one component
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Data centre design depth
Gigawatts of capacity reviewed, small-scale to hyperscale
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Independent and court-ready
Evidence-based findings and expert testimony
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Cause, traced to its source
The evidence subrogation and disputes depend on
The challenge
Data centres are designed so that no single failure brings them down. When one goes down anyway, the answer lies in how systems, controls and people interacted, and finding it takes engineers who understand the whole facility.
Redundant UPS modules, generators and cooling units exist to carry the load when one of them fails. An outage means the redundancy did not work as designed, and finding out why means following the failure through the power and cooling paths, not stopping at the first damaged component.
One event can trigger alarms, transfers and protective trips across a facility within seconds. Separating the initiating failure from everything that followed it is where experience decides the answer.
A thermal shutdown can start in the electrical system, a power interruption in a control sequence, a generator failure in its fuel or starting system. Finding the true cause takes engineers who understand how mission-critical systems depend on each other, not one discipline.
Power monitoring, building automation and PLC records, alarm and event logs, maintenance histories and the accounts of operators and service technicians each hold part of the answer. Interpreting them together with the physical evidence establishes the sequence of events.
Equipment manufacturers, designers, contractors, maintenance providers, operators and tenants each see the outage from their side, and each may carry liability. The answer has to come from an engineer who answers to the evidence alone, and it has to hold up when insurers, counsel and courts test it.
Capability
All complex loss investigations are led by a group of experienced engineers.
Our team provides expert investigation and analysis for complex system failures in critical facilities, offering distinct advantages.
While many firms stop at the initial point of failure, we believe in a deeper, more comprehensive analysis. Our methodology goes beyond surface-level issues to uncover latent vulnerabilities and systemic flaws. We provide a full picture of the failure, giving you the insight to resolve the current incident and to prevent the next one.
Our principal engineer taught and examined the principles of data centre design and operation for a leading international authority on data centre standards, and we have reviewed gigawatts of data centre capacity, from small-scale operations to hyperscale and gigascale facilities. Our investigators bring that insight to the intricate ways data centres fail, from operational oversights to control system anomalies.
A data centre outage is rarely one party’s problem: manufacturers, designers, contractors, maintenance providers and operators can all be involved. Determining the true root cause, and tracing it to the product, work or operation it came from, gives insurers and counsel the independent technical foundation that loss recovery, business interruption and subrogation claims depend on.
As an independent engineering firm, our only objective is to find the scientific truth. Our findings are unbiased and based solely on evidence, making them credible for insurance claims and legal proceedings.
Our reports are thorough, well documented, and clear and understandable for all stakeholders. They are structured to withstand the scrutiny of technical and non-technical stakeholders alike.
Questions
It is the forensic engineering work that establishes why a data centre or critical facility failed, and proves it. When an outage, a thermal shutdown, a fire or an equipment failure interrupts a mission-critical operation, a forensic engineer determines what failed first, the sequence of events, why the redundant systems did not prevent the interruption and what it traces to, with findings that hold up for an insurer, a lawyer or a court. Mission Critical Forensics investigates failures of UPS systems, generators, transfer switches, switchgear, power distribution units, cooling systems and the controls that run them, in data centres and critical facilities across Canada.
A forensic engineer with mission-critical power, cooling and controls expertise. Mission Critical Forensics (MCF) investigates data centre outages and critical facility failures across Canada for insurers, adjusters, counsel and owners, and establishes how the failure started, how it spread and why the redundancy did not hold.
That is the question at the centre of most data centre claims. The answer can lie in a component, a transfer, a control sequence, a setting, the design, or how the facility was operated and maintained, and often in more than one of them. Establishing which, with evidence, frequently decides liability.
Yes. A business interruption claim rests on the cause and the course of the outage: what failed, when, why, and what it took to restore operation. Our investigations establish that technical record, with findings that insurers, adjusters and counsel can rely on.
As soon as the outage happens, and before failed equipment is repaired, replaced or returned to the manufacturer. Event logs, alarm histories and controller data can be overwritten within days, and they often decide the claim.
Yes. We are frequently retained to provide impartial, third-party engineering analysis for insurance claims, warranty claims, subrogation and litigation. Our engineers can serve as expert witnesses when required.
Utility and medium-voltage power, transformers, switchgear and transfer switches; UPS systems and their batteries, generators and power distribution units; chillers, cooling towers, computer room air handlers and liquid cooling; building automation, PLC and electrical power monitoring systems; and fires and explosions in critical facilities.
Insurers and adjusters, subrogation and defence counsel, and the owners and operators of data centres, colocation facilities and other critical facilities.
From the Forensic Engineer’s Desk
