Offshore safety crisis

When 20 workers have died in only the past five years – as a result of two separate accidents, involving the same helicopter model – you’d think government officials would want to get to the bottom of it all.

 
But the UK government responded to a call for a full public inquiry into helicopter safety in the North Sea with a resounding ‘no’ on Monday (October 27), saying there was “no evidence to suggest that UK operations are any less safe than operations conducted by other states, particularly Norway.”

 
Unite Scottish secretary Pat Rafferty condemned the government’s statements, which he called “absolutely scandalous.”

 
“The government states UK operations are as safe as our Norwegian counterparts who have not had one fatality as a result of helicopter transfers since 1997, yet the UK has suffered 38 deaths in the same timeframe, with 20 in the last five years alone,” he said.

 
“If that doesn’t suggest a safety problem then I don’t what does.”

 
Norwegian “gold standard”

 
In the initial transport committee report which called for greater helicopter safety measures and a public inquiry, Unite and the RMT pointed to Norway’s high-calibre safety standards that they assert, had these standards been in place in the UK, would have prevented helicopter accidents in the past five years, including two fatal ones in 2009 and 2013.

 
The report described Norway’s occurrence reporting culture, in which any incident which may endanger aircraft, its occupants, or any other person is duly reported. Although the UK has had such a reporting procedure in place decades before Norway instituted theirs, Norway much more diligently uses it.

 
The report also pointed to the way in which helicopter accidents are assessed in Norway as compared to the UK.

 
Andrew Waterson, professor of health effectiveness at Stirling University said, “With helicopter pilots the Norwegians would not view problems such as ‘pilot error’ being disconnected from the harsh physical and sometimes economic environment and pressures the pilots need to operate within.

 
“Hence Norwegian solutions to certain ‘pilot errors’ would focus on the environment rather than on ‘individual’ failure,” he added.

 
Shattered confidence

 
Following the 2013 Sumburgh crash, in which a Super Puma helicopter plunged into the sea off the south Shetland coast, killing four passengers and injuring 14, Unite officials in Scotland organised the Get Back Home Safe campaign, aimed at preventing future accidents and restoring confidence in the offshore workforce.

 
A Unite survey carried out as part of the campaign asked 1,100 offshore workers about helicopter safety. A strong majority – 53 per cent – said they were not confident in helicopter safety, especially in the Eurocopter Super Puma fleet.

 
A full 77 per cent also said their confidence in helicopter safety had decreased significantly in the previous 12 months following three ditches in 2012 and 2013, including the fatal Sumburgh crash.

 
In response to the survey, Unite regional industrial officer Tommy Campbell said, “The results reinforce what the oil and gas industry already knows and needs to address: worker confidence in offshore helicopter safety has been shattered.”

 
“The industry needs to evolve with its environment,” he added. “With twenty fatalities in the last four years there should be a moral obligation to act on the concerns of its most important resource – its people.”

 
Commercial pressure

 
When the government responded to the transport committee’s recommendations, it noted it had not found “any evidence to suggest safety is being compromised as a result of commercial pressure from the industry,” but Unite regional industrial organiser John Taylor contends otherwise.

 
When he gave evidence to the transport committee in January, he told the committee members how he had received a barrage of emails from workers who wanted to express concern about helicopter safety but asked not to be named.

 
Taylor explained the fear from offshore workers acting under commercial pressure.

 
“Everyone says you can refuse to do the job,” he told the committee. “As trade union officials we represent people who have refused to do the job and then they are suddenly dismissed.

 
“The argument is do you get the oil out safely or safely get the oil out?” he asked. “What’s the first bit, is it safety or the contract? And I believe that commercial pressure is operating in the industry.”

 
The transport committee report noted an incident after the 2013 crash in which oil company Total shockingly told its workers concerned about safety to put on their “big boy pants” or else quit if they couldn’t deal with the risks of operating helicopters.

 
After hearing the government’s decision to summarily reject any further inquiry into the matter, victims’ families from the 2013 crash said they were “horrified” at the injustice. Solicitors representing the families said they would continue to fight the decision.

 
“We will be working with [Labour MP] Frank Doran, the victims’ families, and Unite, and we will all be heading to Westminster to campaign against this decision,” said one of the solicitors.

 
Rafferty emphasised the importance of having a full public inquiry, saying it would “allow a much needed forensic analysis of why we repeatedly encounter these problems with helicopter transfers.”

 
“The UK government has turned its back on the 3,000 workers who supported our Back Home Safe campaign,” he added.