Offshore staff
LONDON — Britain’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has fined Shell and Ampelmann Operations more than £1.2 million ($1.52 million) after the feet of an offshore technician were crushed while he was traversing a motion-compensated gangway in the UK North Sea.
The HSE prosecuted the two companies following the incident off the Norfolk coast of eastern England in October 2017.
Martin Hill, 63 at the time, was among a group of maintenance workers being transferred from the support vessel Kroonborg to Shell’s Galleon PG gas platform when the incident occurred. Investigations found that the transfer should not have taken place due to the high wind and heavy sea conditions at the time.
The distance between the vessel and platform changes with the sea and vessel movement, so any gangway must telescope in and out to keep a full bridge, the HSE said.
As Hill walked along the gangway in the pre-sunrise period, the artificial lighting was insufficient in the places where needed. Both of his feet ended up trapped as the gangway telescoped together, causing him be airlifted to hospital and narrowly avoiding having both feet amputated.
He did not return to offshore work after the incident.
The HSE probe concluded that people using the Ampelmann-designed and owned gangway were not sufficiently protected from the risks of entrapment and trip injury at the moving step, and that the company had failed to take all reasonably practicable steps to reduce the risk of people’s feet being trapped at the sliding step.
Justice Jeremy Johnson said basic errors had been made “which persisted over a long time.” As for Shell’s instructions to the staff supervising transfers, these “were inconsistent and confusing and spread across several documents. They were not understood by those operating the gangway transfer system.”
In addition, Shell had failed to ensure that lighting was in accordance with long-standing guidance available on HSE's website.
HSE inspector John Hawkins said, “It is important operating companies continually challenge themselves, through effective audit and review of their procedures, to make sure their safety management systems are robust enough and that the safety instructions generated are clear, consistent and in accordance with guidance.
“To have workers exposed to a risk of injury when required to do something as basic as walking to work over a gangway does not reflect the standards expected.”
In November the Norwegian Petroleum Safety Authority (PSA) opened an investigation into a facial injury to a technician onboard the OKEA-operated Brage platform in the North Sea. Moreover, another facial injury was investigated by the PSA in late April on the Equinor-operated Statfjord B platform, also in the North Sea.
12.19.2023
