Posted on 11/25/2007 3:16:03 PM PST by familyop
ABERDEEN, Scotland, Nov. 25 (UPI) -- Seven helicopters airlifted workers from a burning North Sea oil rig amid high winds northwest of Scotland Sunday.
More than half of the 159 people on the remote Thistle Alpha platform had been airlifted to neighboring platforms several miles away, CNN reported.
The burning rig is about 227 miles northwest of Aberdeen - "just about as remote as it gets," said British Royal Air Force spokesman Michael Mulford.
The helicopters and one Nimrod aircraft flew from Norway, RAF stations, British Coast Guard stations, and other oil rigs to assist in the evacuation, Mulford told ITN.
"We are very lucky that we have three neighboring platforms within 5 or 6 miles and in that sort of distance we will be able to land an refuel," Mulford said, noting there were no reports of casualties.
God Bless ‘em all. Nobody wants to be on a burning oil production platform in some far away part of the North Sea. They can’t swim home from there.
I hope that they all get off alright.
there’s your hundred dollar catalyst. maybe now we can start selling.
Why is it burning, what caused or is suspected of causing the fire?
That’s a lot of people to be on a drilling rig. It must be a big’un.
Obviously global warming
/sarc
As big as those ships are (and this of course isn’t a ~~1000 footer like most modern Royal Caribbean or Carnival cruise ship) that sure looks like a toy sitting sideways on the ice like that.
Most likely a fire started in the processing facilities due to a leak or metal fatigue in a high pressure line. I doubt it was a well since when you have a ESD or emergency shut down, the safety valves in the wells close.
It accounted for around ten per cent of the oil and gas production from the North Sea at the time.
At the peak production of Piper Alpha, it produced 3.86 million tonnes per year of crude (77.2 MBPD)
http://163.164.19.97/information/bb_updates/appendices/fields/piper.htm
http://www.eppo.go.th/ref/UNIT-OIL.html
In 1988, when Piper burned, the North Sea produced 3,495 MBPD. Piper was producing 2%, not 10% of the North Sea. When the article starts out that way, everything else is not believeable.
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