Forensic vigilance indicates a central competency that forensic professionals need to work in the highly specialized and complex field of forensic psychiatric settings. The term originated in the Netherlands as “forensische scherpte”, but represents an internationally relevant construct (Clercx et al., 2021). Forensic vigilance is often considered pivotal in maintaining safety and preventing incidents in forensic psychiatric settings. However it is unknown precisely how forensic vigilance relates to incident prevention, and whether different types of incidents (e.g. aggression towards others, suicide, absconsions, unprofessional relationships with patients) require different aspects of forensic vigilance.The current study utilized a combination of thematic and interpretative analyses of incident reports on incidents that occurred in 8 high secure forensic psychiatric hospitals. We developed a model of forensic vigilance, and identified key attributes and differences in these between different types of incidents, and refined this model in expert meetings with forensic psychiatric professionals.