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Emmanuel Usende
“Available in the Warehouse” — Offshore’s Greatest Plot Twist Every offshore maintenance planner knows this moment. You check the system. Status: Material — Available ✅ You prepare the job. You line up the crew. You get the permit. You arrive at the warehouse. Suddenly: • The item is “around somewhere” • The tag exists, but the part doesn’t • Or worse — it’s there… but it’s damaged, incomplete, or not certified Warehouse assurance? Not always assuring. Sometimes, Offshore maintenance execution doesn’t fail because of bad technicians. It stalls because one “available” item isn’t actually available. And when that happens, given the constraints of offshore supplies: • Crew hours are wasted • Permits expire • Schedules slip • Production windows close • Everyone looks at maintenance like they planned badly The lesson? Reliability isn’t just about equipment condition. It’s about material integrity, physical verification, and honest stock status. If it’s not tagged, verified, and ready to issue — it’s not available. Offshore reality. If you know, you know. 😄
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Ian Garden
FALSE POSITIVE – Short Film Preview (4 x Rough Cut Clips) Grounded in the latest HSE findings and supported by evidence reaching back to the Piper 25 Conference in 2013, False Positive explores how a persistent “false positive” safety narrative has left parts of the UK offshore sector more exposed than at any time since Piper Alpha. Drawing on official HSE data and industry communications, the film reveals a recurring pattern of public praise masking unresolved safety-critical weaknesses. It presents a factual review of how well-intentioned initiatives and commercial priorities may have normalised non-compliance and discouraged open dialogue. Every CEO, OIM and Safety Representative should take ten minutes to watch these four (4) short clips, or play them at their next safety meeting. It is a moment to pause, reflect, and ask whether the lessons from Piper Alpha have truly been learned. For those with the courage and first-hand experience to contribute, confidential channels remain open. All identities will be protected to ensure there is no risk of reprisal or detriment for speaking up in the public interest. Drop me a note on ian@rigdeluge.com and I will pass to the team. Safety is not just a policy. It is a promise. Offshore Energies UK Step Change in Safety Health and Safety Executive NEO NEXT Energy Spirit Energy repsol Valaris Limited North Sea Transition Authority GB Energy Energy Voice STV Group plc Channel4 GBNews GBN David Whitehouse Mark Wilson OEUK Craig Wiggins Sarah Albon CB Ferdinando Rigardo Adam Sheikh (NEO NEXT) Mike Brady (NEO NEXT) Horge Barron Lorena Dominguez Espido Neil McCulloch David Jeffree Chris McCrindle Peter Medlam Archie Glover CMgr MCMI John Bull Matthew B. Dana Petroleum Limited Gillian Urquhart Peter Wilson David King Ellis Renforth Camilla Salthe Doris Reiter John Pearson Nicolas Payer Matthew Brodie Sarah Moore Scott Barr Steve Bowyer Phil Milton Steve Wisely Luciano Vasques Barry Macleod Diane Frachon
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Pedro Mathias
THE PERFECT STORM — EPILOGUE What if we put this entire story into a Bow Tie? In the previous posts, we went back to December 2011. First, an inadvertent activation of the emergency disconnect system sent the BOP — the safety equipment that controls the well on the seabed — to the ocean floor. Then, while recovering the LMRP, the upper disconnectable section of that system, we were repressurizing the high-pressure air accumulators of the rig’s motion compensation system. A task was interrupted. A valve remained open. About two minutes later, a high-pressure line exploded. Fortunately, no one was injured. The explanation seemed simple: “the valve was left open.” But the investigation revealed much more: pressure, temperature, materials, procedures, interruptions, competing priorities, and barrier architecture. The design changed. New barriers were introduced. To close the cycle, I propose looking at this story through a Bow Tie. At the center is the moment we lose control. On one side are threats and preventive barriers. On the other, potential consequences and barriers to limit escalation. In our case: LOSS OF CONTROL OF THE ACCUMULATOR PRESSURIZATION AND THERMAL CONDITION Before that point: rapid pressurization, simultaneous operations, task interruption, and a change in priority. Cognitive load, reliance on memory, and a critical function concentrated in a single human action could degrade the defenses. The open valve then stops being simply “the cause” and becomes part of a broader sequence. That is where the Bow Tie becomes powerful: it allows us to visualize which barriers existed, which could be degraded, and which needed strengthening or introduction. On the other side are potential consequences: rupture, flying components, fire, personnel exposure, and potential fatality—along with barriers intended to limit escalation. What can degrade each barrier? Counting them is not enough. We need to understand what they do, what they depend on, how they lose effectiveness, and whether they are truly independent. This is where different perspectives come together. HAZOP challenges deviations and safeguards; LOPA challenges the robustness and independence of protection layers; and Human Factors helps us understand how barriers interact with work as actually done. People are also part of the defense. But critical systems must account for a human reality: we get interrupted, face competing priorities, and can forget an action. So the question changes from: “Who left the valve open?” to: “What set of barriers should prevent a predictable human variation from finding an unobstructed path to a serious consequence?” After four chapters, perhaps this is the best image to close the cycle: At the center of the Bow Tie is the moment we lose control. The barriers hold everything we learned to keep it from happening again. #HereComesAStory #ProcessSafety #HumanFactors #HAZOP #LOPA
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