If the analysis of major failures is considered, many possible modes of failure would have been reviewed in the safety assessments made when the structure was built. For example, analysis of how the towers of the World Trade Center would behave when hit by an aircraft was considered, the problem being that only smaller airliners were thought of as possible hazards.

Thus, the engineering consultancies carrying out such safety analyses are likely to perform much forensic engineering for courts of inquiry. This means that their engineers are likely to be practising forensic engineering as a part of their duties. This emphasis on subject experience will also mean that staffs of university engineering departments are likely to be involved, again as part of their overall duties.

For the failure of consumer products it may be that local trading standards officers will be the first to pick up a problem and they may refer it to expertise at local universities. Separate failure analysis companies with their own laboratories exist in the United States and are likely to become more common in the UK.

The key to their success will be maintaining a high and varied workload in order to recruit and retain real subject experts. A very specialist branch of forensic engineering is the analysis of patented engineering products, where it is believed that one company has infringed the patent of another. These cases can be very intricate and complex, as well as expensive for both the patent owner and the alleged infringer. With authoritative forensic engineering it is possible that these cases can be settled at an earlier and less expensive stage. With this description of forensic engineering it is likely to be a profession that employs most of its members part-time. They are likely to be chartered engineers, many will have postgraduate degrees in their specialised subject and the more senior could well be Fellows of their professional scientific or engineering institution.