Early yesterday morning it seemed the name Thistle Alpha might join the roll of North Sea tragedies alongside Piper Alpha. The fire on the platform 120 miles north of Shetland came within days of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) warning companies operating in the North Sea that they were risking a major accident because poor maintenance was compromising safety.
Publication of the damning report had already rekindled memories of the Piper Alpha explosion, which killed 167 people in July 1988, and that was before the Thistle Alpha fire resulted in the scrambling of seven emergency helicopters. Thankfully, there were no casualties yesterday, and there is nothing to suggest fault on behalf of the operator. The workers have been returned after being evacuated to neighbouring installations. However, the incident should bring safety on to the agenda of the next board meeting of every company operating in the North Sea, because the report made clear that some operators are failing in their duty and, in some cases, failing to comply with the law. For instance, half the fire-fighting deluge water systems tested failed to meet the required standard.
Health and Safety Commission chair Judith Hackitt said "corporate memory" had been lost since the disaster, and suggested that 19 years' changes of personnel and ownership had allowed the findings of the Cullen Inquiry into the disaster to be forgotten. In particular, there was a failure to recognise that when a "non-safety-critical" plant is degraded, that can make it dangerous in the event of a major accident.
There have been persistent complaints about safety on the ageing platforms for many years, along with allegations that workers who make complaints about safety procedures are effectively blacklisted. The HSE inspection found that more than half the installations checked, including fixed platforms, mobile drilling rigs and vessels, were in poor condition. That should be serious cause for concern, not least because by any standards the North Sea is one of the most challenging work environments on earth. Of course, economics plays a part: as oil production has declined since the booms of 1985 and 1999, so has investment. Yet operators range from relatively new firms to global energy companies such as Shell and BP, and the HSE suggested there was need for sharing of best practice. If the HSE is committed to that, they should go ahead with their threat to name and shame those operators who fail the safety inspections, and their licences should then be withdrawn.
There is no suggestion of blame on the part of the operators of Thistle Alpha, and the workers - and helicopter crews who went out to rescue them in difficult conditions - were fortunate. Yet with the price of oil, including Brent crude, within shouting distance of $100 a barrel, there is every incentive to extract the last, previously uneconomic, drop from the North Sea; and that means there can be no excuse for compromising on safety.
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