Oil Safety News

Danish police have over the weekend received reports of drone activity near the Roar gas field in the North Sea, a police spokesperson said on Tuesday. The Roar field is next to Denmark's largest gas field, Tyra, both of which are operated by TotalEnergies.Denmark has, like some other countries in the region, raised its emergency preparedness level for its power and gas sector after several countries said two Russian pipelines to Europe leaking gas into the Baltic Sea had been subject to sabotage.

A fire on the ocean surface west of Mexico's Yucatan peninsula early on Friday has been extinguished, state oil company Pemex said, blaming a gas leak from an underwater pipeline for sparking the blaze captured in videos that went viral.Bright orange flames jumping out of water resembling molten lava was dubbed an "eye of fire" on social media due to the blaze's circular shape, as it raged a short distance from a Pemex oil platform.The fire took more than five hours to fully put out…

The International Maritime Organization (IMO)'s Maritime Safety Committee (MSC) has approved measures to improve the safety for seafarers when mooring ships.Danish Maritime Authority (DMA) said in a press release that between 5 and 14 June, MSC met in London to discuss current issues related to the safety and security of global shipping.Part of the agenda was dedicated to the draft measures for safe mooring operations as prepared by the SDC sub-committee based on proposals originally submitted by Denmark.The measures approved by the Committee entails an amended SOLAS regulation and guidelines intended to improve the current situation…

The Maritime Safety Committee (MSC) is meeting for its 101st session, with a busy agenda encompassing maritime autonomous surface ships, polar shipping, goal-based standards and other agenda items.A number of draft amendments will be adopted, including amendments to mandatory Codes covering the carriage of potentially hazardous cargoes: the MSC is set to adopt the draft consolidated edition of the International Maritime Solid Bulk Cargoes Code (IMSBC Code), and a comprehensive set of draft amendments to the International Code for the Construction and Equipment of Ships Carrying Dangerous Chemicals in Bulk (IBC Code).The MSC will be updated on the regulatory scoping exercise on maritime autonomous surface ships…

The Obama administration on Thursday unveiled new oil well control rules to prevent the kind of blowout that happened six years ago on a BP Plc rig in the Gulf of Mexico. The Interior Department's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement announced the finalized regulations, which include more stringent design requirements and operational procedures for offshore U.S. oil and gas operations. The new standards come nearly six years after a deadly explosion and fire on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig off the cost of Louisiana, which led to the worst oil spill of all time.

Loading of tankers suspended, unclear when it will resume. Oil spilled into the North Sea during the loading of a tanker at Norway's Statfjord field on Thursday, operator Statoil said. The leak occurred at 0630 GMT during the loading of oil to a tanker from the Statfjord A platform via a loading buoy, Statoil said. Production at the platform was proceeding as normal, but loading of tankers has been suspended and it is unclear when it will resume, it added. "We are currently focusing on determining the cause of the leak and how much oil leaked," a spokesman told Reuters. "The leak has been located ... The Norwegian oil safety regulator was unable to provide further details. The Statfjord A platform can store up to 1.3 million barrels of oil.

Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) last week introduced the “Stop Oil Spills Act,” a bill to fund research into new oil spill prevention and response technologies. Following BP CEO Tony Hayward’s admission that his company did not have a “tool-kit” to respond to a sizeable spill from a deep-water well, Markey introduced the bill to create a research program to develop 21st century oil safety and spill response technologies. “As the big oil companies have continued to push the limits to drill ultra-deep…

On March 24, 1989, the tanker Exxon Valdez grounded on Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound, Alaska. The resultant spill of 11 million gallons of crude oil was not the largest in US history and most people forget that salvage and response efforts kept the majority of the oil safety on board the ship. The incident resulted in the relatively swift passage of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90). A subsequent USCG Report  provides some context for the incident and changes that resulted therefrom. One of the ironies of history is that Bligh Reef was named by Captain James Cook (during his third voyage of exploration in 1778) for William Bligh, who served as master of the HMS RESOLUTION during the expedition.