The distinction between an accident and an incident is primarily based on whether the outcome was preventable.

• A. Preventable
• B. Predictable
• C. Unpredictable
• D. Attributable

Answer: (A)

Preventability of the outcome is the key idea here. In safety terms, an incident is any event that could have caused harm but didn’t, or where harm occurred but the outcome wasn’t a result of an unavoidable path. An accident, on the other hand, is an event in which harm does occur and the outcome is considered preventable with proper controls, safeguards, or procedural changes. So the defining feature is whether the adverse outcome could have been prevented; if it could have been prevented, that outcome is categorized as an accident, whereas events without a harmful outcome (or where harm wasn’t realized) are incidents. The other options—whether it was predictable, unpredictable, or attributable—don’t capture this practical distinction used in incident investigations.