The Elgin blowout - what are the lessons?
Posted: Sat 10 Nov 2018, 07:55:37
https://elginblowout.com/hse-report-on- ... -redacted/
It’s over six years since the G4 well on the Elgin platform on the North Sea was allowed to blow out, endangering the lives of the 238 men on board the complex.
For those 6 years, I’ve been trying to get my head around how the blowout was allowed to happen. I’m trying to make sure that eventually the lessons learnt are set down in a language accessible to non-specialist oil workers and then shared widely amongst the workforce.
It’s been a rocky road and I’ve had a lot of communications with the HSE, the Information Commissioner, the relevant Minister of State (UK) - not all of it edifying. There will be a “first-tier” tribunal hearing sometime soon, where a judge will make a decision about the “plausibility” or otherwise of the HSE’s responses to me when I asked for a copy of oil company Total’s report of their internal investigation into the near disaster. After initially telling me they had the report but were withholding it because of the pending prosecution of Total, they subsequently told me they did not have a copy and had never asked Total for a copy.
I’m making available on this board, a heavily redacted (by HSE) copy of the HSE’s report into their investigation. HSE has no plans to publish it. Anyone with any acquaintance at all with the blowout will notice that there is no mention made of the naked flame that burned in the flare stack about 100 m from the blowout at the wellhead throughout the emergency. The report asks as many questions as it answers.
I really need some support from informed oilfield engineers. I know that at the time, ROCKMAN, who uses this forum, wrote very perceptively about the blowout on “The Oil Drum” forum which has since been archived. If he or anyone else is prepared to have a look at the report posted I’d be obliged. That the lessons are not out there is a disgrace. But I need help. My MP (Member of Parliament - UK) and I will meet with the HSE sometime in the not too distant future. I need to be as clear as possible about what happened and why if I have any hope of persuading them to prepare a document and circulate it throughout the industry.
It’s over six years since the G4 well on the Elgin platform on the North Sea was allowed to blow out, endangering the lives of the 238 men on board the complex.
For those 6 years, I’ve been trying to get my head around how the blowout was allowed to happen. I’m trying to make sure that eventually the lessons learnt are set down in a language accessible to non-specialist oil workers and then shared widely amongst the workforce.
It’s been a rocky road and I’ve had a lot of communications with the HSE, the Information Commissioner, the relevant Minister of State (UK) - not all of it edifying. There will be a “first-tier” tribunal hearing sometime soon, where a judge will make a decision about the “plausibility” or otherwise of the HSE’s responses to me when I asked for a copy of oil company Total’s report of their internal investigation into the near disaster. After initially telling me they had the report but were withholding it because of the pending prosecution of Total, they subsequently told me they did not have a copy and had never asked Total for a copy.
I’m making available on this board, a heavily redacted (by HSE) copy of the HSE’s report into their investigation. HSE has no plans to publish it. Anyone with any acquaintance at all with the blowout will notice that there is no mention made of the naked flame that burned in the flare stack about 100 m from the blowout at the wellhead throughout the emergency. The report asks as many questions as it answers.
I really need some support from informed oilfield engineers. I know that at the time, ROCKMAN, who uses this forum, wrote very perceptively about the blowout on “The Oil Drum” forum which has since been archived. If he or anyone else is prepared to have a look at the report posted I’d be obliged. That the lessons are not out there is a disgrace. But I need help. My MP (Member of Parliament - UK) and I will meet with the HSE sometime in the not too distant future. I need to be as clear as possible about what happened and why if I have any hope of persuading them to prepare a document and circulate it throughout the industry.