After Piper Alpha
July 6th 1988 was a dark day in the history of HPHT drilling. The Piper Alpha platform in the North Sea developed a gas leak, exploded and sank into the sea, leaving 167 dead and only 62 survivors.
The aftermath of this disaster has had far-reaching consequences for the families of all the victims, as well as the companies who employ HPHT drilling on oil and gas rigs.
The first consequence of the disaster was the establishment of the Cullen Inquiry in November 1988. The findings of this Inquiry were released in November 1990 and, although the Inquiry was very critical of Occidental – the operating company – no criminal charges were made. The inquiry found that there was a severe lack of safety standards on Piper Alpha as well as inadequate maintenance procedures.
A more important aspect of the Inquiry is that it made 106 suggestions regarding the safety protocols and procedures for the rigs in the North Sea. All of these suggestions were accepted without question.
The most important outcome of the Inquiry was that the Health and Safety Executive would take over enforcing safety in the North Sea from the Department of Energy. The main argument for this move was that production and safety are in conflict with one another and should therefore be managed by different authorities.
The survivors and the families of those who had succumbed banded together and formed an association - Piper Alpha Families and Survivors Association – which now focuses and campaigns on safety issues on rigs in the North Sea.
120 metres from Piper Bravo (Piper Alpha’s successor) is a wreck buoy marking the place where Piper Alpha sank into the sea. Another memorial is a statue in the Rose Garden in Hazlehead, Aberdeen. The twentieth anniversary saw the production of a play – ‘Lest We Forget’ – written by Mike Gibb. The final performance was on 6 July 2008, exactly 20 years after the disaster.
Another positive result of the disaster was the formation of the new trade union, Offshore Industry Liaison Committee. This is the first post-Margaret Thatcher trade union to be formed.
The aftermath was far more significant to the survivors and the families of the deceased. Professor David Alexander of the Aberdeen Centre for Trauma Research at Robert Gordon University did a study of the social and psychological effects on the survivors. He found only thirty-six participants, but the findings were significant. Almost all of the participants reported symptoms that indicated post traumatic stress disorder. Along with that, the majority of survivors were having difficulties finding work on offshore rigs. They were considered as bad luck for the rig.
Prof. Alexander, however, also found that many of them left the disaster a hero in their own right.