I would be interested to see if TRANSOCEAN filed the Deepwater Aasgard required CG-2692 ( 2692 Casualty Report of marine casualty, commercial, diving casualty, or OCS-related casualty) reporting the loss of propulsion and flooding to the District 8 OCS office in the required 72 hours…
1 Like
FYI just published our story on the incident
6 Likes
Thats a good synopsis and glad to see some coverage. I take a little issue with this statement though:
Offshore drilling experts say it’s important to distinguish between the roles of the captain and drilling team. The captain of a drillship is part of the deck or bridge team, responsible for navigating the ship, while the plaintiff in this case was a member (a senior member) of the drilling or engineering team with in-depth knowledge of drilling operations.
That makes it sound like Deepwater Horizon days of confusion and segregated authority, and that is simply not the case for at least the last 5+ years. TOI, like probably all drilling contractors these days, have a single Master/OIM. He is not just part of the bridge team, he is overall in charge of the entire vessel and operation including final approvals onboard for drilling operations. The main department heads under him include the Drilling Superintendent (oversees drilling), the Chief Engineer/Maintenance Supervisor (oversees Subsea), and you could include the Chief Mate (oversees Deck/Bridge).
Yes, there is some overlap in that Subsea operations is an integral part of Drilling, but on the Organizational Chart they fall under the C/E/Maint Sup. And with advent of the combined Master/OIM there were some with less drilling experience who had to lean more on the Drilling Sup when making decisions, but on any rig I worked in more recent years there was no question that Master/OIM had overriding authority. Certainly not just responsible for navigating the ship with no interest in drilling operations.
3 Likes
I understand what you’re saying. From the compliant it says “Plaintiff, along with other crewmembers on board, strongly disagreed with the decision to stay latched but had no other options but to obey orders.” Presumably it’s referring to the Captain’s decision, correct? So the plaintiff and other crew members (presumably acting as advisors) strongly disagreed with the decision.
Is there another way to word it or something I can add to be more clear?
The complaint says before that line “Transocean and Beacon ordered the vessel to stay latched.” But ultimately the Captain has the authority to override that decision for safety of the vessel and the well operation. (Frankly I’d be astonished if Company Man was ok with what his office was pushing). So I think the plaintiff and other crewmembers likely disagreed strongly with both the office and the Captain’s decision to stay latched. I suppose it goes back to other discussions on how confident any Captain is in his job security and how ok he is with potentially losing it to do what is right.
Regarding the passage I highlighted, it just seems (to me) that it could be interpreted that the Captain is mainly in charge of the vessel and not so much the drilling team/operations, and should be distinguished [in its chain of command]. But at the end of the day both Mr. Pleasant looking after the integrity of his well-control equipment, and the drilling team preparing to pulling riser, all answer to the Captain. So in essence in this scenario when the Captain is the OIM, I actually don’t think it is “important to distinguish between the roles of the Captain and the drilling team” per se.
Interesting discussion by both sides. I know nothing about drillships, but see both sides. I do have experience avoiding bad weather.
With all of the stakeholders, in actual practice, most decisions are a consensus after having these types of meetings. Of course, the Master is the PIC and would drive the consensus, but that is his/her job. Then, after whatever decisions are made, you communicate this to the crew and department heads in a deliberate fashion. If there are objections, those should be heard and addressed at the time. On complex vessels, particularly with all of the technical expertise areas, this is pretty important and necessary. There was an obvious disconnect somewhere; you should not learn of objections for the first time in a lawsuit. I am still of the belief that they simply ran out of time due to well control. I’m sure they weighed the risk in terms of recovering the LMRP to the surface and possibly determined that by the time it got to the splash zone, having personnel working over the water to deal with mux lines and getting the LMRP secured/captured for transit was outside environmental limits and too risky for personnel. Rule of Thumb: If you cannot rescue someone that fell into the water, you do not allow them to work over the water, period. Alternatively, if they truly believed, based on the forecast, that they could stay on location and compensate while remaining connected to the well, then personnel are at less risk. Obviously, in the end, they were outside of environmental limits no matter what decision was made since it was taken so late. The question then centers back to the plaintiff because the Sr. Subsea had reservations about the tensioners. You could tell by the video that there was an issue with the Olmsted valves with a few pairs of tensioners out of balance. I’m curious about this aspect as well. You have redundancy and even an FMEA type document with the riser analysis that will get into technical details on minimum tensioner pairs and pressures versus mud weight/saltwater to run at any given time. This is a moot point since it’s questionable that a 100% operating system with full redundancy even matters. An EDS would have been executed as soon as the vessel was at the red circle, which I doubt was adjusted down for real-time environmental conditions as demonstrated by being over equipment limits and the riser hitting the hull. To me, it all comes back to killing the well, the cement squeeze job, and the well suspension operations. This is where the critical decisions were made that affected the timeline the most. T-times should have a 24-hour safety factor, for equipment failures or other considerations like de-manning, which can be unrealistic for quick developing storms in close proximity (ie. Yukatan/Bay of Campeche). This was one of those types of storms, meaning decisions should be conservatively made with the presumption that developing storms in close proximity will be realized as a cyclone and you should begin evacuation plans regardless. The only thing that you can lose (in terms of the progress with the well) or gain (in terms of an evacuation) by taking early decisions is time. I will take the time and if it’s explained to the client in those terms, 99% of the time, they will take that option as well.
5 Likes
I can’t speak for the drilling side but with deep-sea or just in general it’s more about reputational risk than simply getting fired or not.
If over time a captain builds a reputation of being on time with low accident / incident rate and close on the budget etc. than that captain will be more effective in getting the cooperation of the company.
Conversely a single high-cost bad decision, for example taking precautions that apparently later turn out to be unnecessary, may result is a hit on reputation which may lower the captains effectiveness with regards to getting things done.
“At the 4:00 p.m. phone call, Transocean and Beacon ordered the vessel to stay latched despite Hurricane Zeta headed directly toward them. Plaintiff, along with other crew members on board, strongly disagreed with the decision to stay latched but had not other options but to obey orders.”
The Captain, however, did have options. Since when does shore-based management give “orders” to the Captain; especially, when it pertains to the safety of the crew and vessel?
Section 5.2 of the ISM Code: Master’s Responsibility & Authority
The Company should ensure that the SMS (safety management system) operating on board the ship contains a clear statement emphasizing the master’s authority. The Company should establish in the SMS that the master has the overriding authority and responsibility to make decisions with respect to safety and pollution prevention and to request the Company’s assistance as may be necessary.
There still appears to be much of the culture of the offshore drilling industry
that doesn’t recognize the above and don’t comprehend that dynamical-positioned modu’s and/or drillship are vessels first and a drilling rig second.
Given Transocean’s past with the “Deepwater Horizon” tragedy it appears that their culture has not changed and that is most unfortunate.
Jeff Hagopian
Cell: 978-764-3908
Email: jbhagop@yahoo.com
Most everyone would agree with this premise, but I do think this part of the lawsuit is pretty weak. Why do I say that? Number one, the plaintiff and the “other crewmembers” would not be in this call. So, this is a presumption at best in terms of the Captain being overruled. I gave my 2 cents on this one already. I think it’s a little far-fetched that after this phone call, the Captain comes out and tells the crew, “look, guys, we have plenty of time to leave and get in safe waters, but the office said no.” Really? This is where my pragmatic nature gets a little lost. But, even with this thought process, BSEE’s safety alert did bring up UWA discrepancies which reinforce the complaint. I don’t know - it’s pretty damn stupid.
1 Like
I can see the Captain, the OIM/Rig Manager (it was unclear to me if in this instance the Captain was also the OIM) and the Senior Subsea Engineer on that call. I go back to where they were, earlier in the day, making preparations to get off the well and then stopped until the outcome of the 4:00 p.m. call. The fact that the Captain had, earlier in that day, determined that they needed to unlatch due to the impending storm tells me that they knew severe weather was coming and that there was real potential for trouble. They stopped the process and after the call went back to work. I have a hard time believing the Captain thought it was safe to stay on that well…especially where earlier in the day they were preparing to unlatch and get out of harms way. I am of the opinion that he knew it was risky and dangerous but caved in to the pressure of the company.
Jeff Hagopian
Cell: 978-764-3908
Email: jbhagop@yahoo.com
We also don’t have all of the information. I agree with @anchorman. For one, from working in locations near that vessel before, they may have been in the loop current, in which anyone that has had to pull riser in that, knows that sometimes a controlled drift is needed. In the GOM, also deeper water is typically South - Southeast from a locations, maybe because of the current, they would have had to transit, with the riser hanging into deeper water, to start the controlled drift to pull riser, and maybe that track would of put them deeper into the storm. (This happened to me on a rig in the GOM in 2004). As @anchorman said, weather restrictions also played a part, once you get into position to pull riser, you now need people over the water and at heights, which on most rigs is a no go above 35 kts, so maybe that was also not an option. Life over equipment is always the right choice. So again, what was the current, what was the position of the rig to the storm track, and the deeper water needs to be taken into consideration. If they disconnected and wanted to run (into deeper water) because they could not pull, that speed typically is 1kt give or take.
3 Likes
At this point everything is conjecture, there is simply not enough evidence to arrive at a conclusion. There were obviously numerous conversations between shoreside management, Beacon and the rig. From experience I know many of these were video calls which could have been recorded. Then there were the private phone calls between the OIM/Captain and his handlers on shore.
VDR is required on all ships of any size but the root cause of any information captured by a VDR will not be discovered unless a similar system is required which demands all operational orders to a ship or drilling rig are also recorded. Until that happens it becomes one persons word against another person. As these incidents have the capacity to injure many people and may have catastrophic effects on the environment it would seen reasonable to record all operational conversations. Personally, if I were a captain being “ordered” to make a decision I did not agree with I would like it on record. Yeah, I would lose my job but at least no one could blame it on me and fault would lie on the mindset that gave me that “order.”
1 Like
The question as to whether the captain should follow orders from the company is irrelevant because the company is not authorized to give orders.
When I was captain I’d get what were called instructions as well as schedules but there are also general instructions wrt keeping ship and crew safe that have higher priority than sailing instructions.
Sorting conflicting priorities is just part of the job.
EDIT: Generally speaking you’re given two choices, bad and worse.
2 Likes
True, but it boils down to the old maxim, the captain is the final authority on the ship but the company decides who is the captain. So, unless independently wealthy the captain can be faced with rolling the dice and risking his crew or his livelihood knowing full well he may never find another job. Team player comes to mind
1 Like
Dealing with commercial pressures is a major part of the job, that’s why QHSE managers coming on board saying ‘safety is the only thing that matters’ piss me off so much. It completely ignores that we are managing risk (rather than eliminating it completely, if you want that: Stay in port). In the end we are part of a commercial operation and need to make the money that pays the bills, whether it is transporting boxes or drilling holes in the seabed, taking calculated risks is part of that.
Maybe I’m unusually lucky, but I have in 8 years as a captain never had the office question my decisions to the point that I felt my job was on the line (Even though some of them were expensive).
You use all the resources and knowledge available, specialists on board and on the beach, and make an informed decision. Sure there is discussion with the commercial people, and they may need some explaining, but in the end nobody ashore has the complete picture that we have on board. After all if the company doesn’t trust your judgement what the hack are you doing being a captain on one of their ships?
2 Likes
It’s a common fallacy that not having an incident means that the operation was safe, Murphy was dead wrong on that… Usually when you don’t take precautions you still get away with it. The problem is that if a certain job/action or non-action has a 1% risk of sinking the ship we should not be doing it. But of course in 99% of the cases the precaution (say disconnecting from the well before the approaching storm) was not needed - the ship came through all right.
However multiply this over your fleet and over a couple of decades and you are going to lose a ship to it.
2 Likes
As far as shipping that is correct. But drillships only in recent years accepted the idea of a captain much less his authority. Having a marine crew was a necssary evil. They were drilling companies not shipping companies and would remind you the ship only exists to drill for oil for Shell, BP etc. That mindsets persists to this day to a degree.
3 Likes
My knowledge of drilling is limited to that I absorbed as the master of an AHTS. I would imagine that masters on these vessels would have served in other roles onboard combined with obtaining further qualifications pertaining to the drilling industry before assuming the position as master/OIM.
As master of a seismic survey vessel the party chief and I collaborated on decisions with me being the final decision on safety of the vessel and personnel. I had to make sure I had my ducks in a row as sometimes the decisions cost money. Because I had the party chief as a sounding board it helped me with stating my case and I never experienced any pushback from the office.
2 Likes
