[QUOTE=catherder;160177]The frog, sitting in a pan of water, does not notice the temperature rise when the pan is placed on the fire…until it’s too late to jump out.[/QUOTE]
Sounds like the drill floor we are talking about
Take your best shot scooter. If you were such a man of integrity and had witnessed "criminal" violations you should've blown the whistle. What did it matter to you if you were blackballed from the oilfield? According to you we're all stupid and none of us are real sailors. Why would you want to work down here or be associated with it in any way? If you had stood up and said something back then they wouldn't be massing their fleet in your backyard as we speak. Better yet who would be the perfect man to run the whole show up there than Scooter Deepthroat? You would be the natural choice to run a huge drilling operation with all your years of local knowledge running fishing boats up there. I mean fishing boats and arctic drilling it's all the same right?
You didn’t see anything and if you did you were to scared to say anything. You sat there for 2 years taking Joe Boss’s silver and snacking on his sandwiches. He brought them right up to the masters cabin on a silver platter. You wore out your welcome and they ran you off. If you had anything you could’ve taken them all down. Now it’s easy to sit here being a keyboard commando and say you saw stuff when you didn’t. You didn’t need to get a group of people together or write letters to your senator or anything difficult. One simple phone call with specific info and you were one surprise inspection away from setting the whole thing right. Go wave your flaccid stick at something else.
Do you feel better now?
What is amazing is how all you GoM apologists like yourself can never refute any of my claims so can only go after me instead…not much if a debate here
There is nothing further to debate here. Mr Integrity was counting his silver and shopping on govt auction sites when he should’ve been blowing the whistle. You can’t bitch about something that was in your power to change with a simple anonymous phone call. I’m not an apologist just pointing out your hypocrisy.
It’s easy to say there should have been a whistle blown, and maybe there should have been, but keep in mind he would have been taking on Big Oil. Even if he were to take them on, even if he were 100% correct, they would likely just wear him down with their armies of lawyers and lobbyists. In order to win that fight I’d think you’d need the metaphorical smoking gun, something that just simply can’t be “explained away”, and that’s not necessarily easy to obtain. I’m not saying blowing the whistle couldn’t be done, just that someone doing that would be stonewalled at nearly every turn.
So after the largest oil spill ever he wouldn’t have gotten the backing needed to fight this? He would’ve had every Eco lawyer looking to make a name lining up to take his case pro bono. He makes it sound as if smoking guns were laying all about by calling their safety practices “criminal”. In two years as master of a drillship if things were as bad as he claims he had more than enough time to smuggle the smoking guns out. He could’ve gone to the gcaptain staff to get the story out there also. He’s all hat and no cattle in his claims on this matter.
Such a vain attempt to turn this back on me…it ain’t working but keep trying if you want to
Oh it’s working scooter because you keep coming back here to act like it’s not. If things are getting to real we can go back to trading silly memes and YouTube clips. I must admit you occasionally come up with some good ones.
Another thread gone off the rails. Who woulda thunk it? Anyway, in a possibly vain effort to get this back on track…
DWH happened five years ago–wow, it doesn’t seem like it’s been that long. I guess it’s like they say, fun flies when you’re doing time. Or something like that.
Looking at from the mariner perspective, often when we have a disaster new regulations and requirements come sweeping in. Look at the [I]Cosco Busan[/I] incident as an example. In terms of maritme disasters it wasn’t what I would call truly major–little to no damage to the bridge, some oil spilled but not anywhere near what we’ve seen from, say, the [I]Exxon Valdez[/I] or [I]Torrey Canyon[/I] disasters. Perhaps more than a minor incident, but not a true disaster I’d say. Next thing we know we’re looking at stricter medical standards and an almost complete overhaul of how mariner medicals are handled and reviewed. I’m not saying those standards weren’t needed, Lord knows there were plenty of guys who should never have been going to sea and most have been weeded out. But the overall point is, an incident happened and now we’re dealing with more, and that’s just one small example.
When a major disaster like DWH happens, I would expect there to be sweeping reforms, increased safety standards, and [I]heavily increased enforcement of those standards[/I]. People died, lots of oil spilled with the attendant environmental damage–have GOM fisheries come back in any way since? Yet, it sounds to me as though operators have gone back to turning a blind eye to safety standards–in other words, complacency is creeping back in. For me, that culture comes from the top. If the people in charge demand a focus on safety above all else, if they are constantly on the lookout for complacency and nip it in the bud when that happens, that culture trickles down to even the lowliest operator. Also the folks controlling the purse strings need to subscribe to this culture–safety cannot be overlooked or sidestepped simply because it costs a few more dollars. “We don’t have the budget this month” is simply not an adequate excuse when required critical or safety equipment needs to be repaired/replaced/upgraded. And those in charge of enforcement–Class, USCG–need to be keeping up with that enforcement and need to be perfectly willing to order a shutdown of operations until safety deficiencies are corrected and proven so.
I’m with c.scooter the IADC needs to come up with its own STCW style training. If I have to be trained and certificated to international standards why shouldn’t they. Another good point is why isn’t there a VDR in the drill shack? Although you would then need an independent body like an FAA or NTSB to interpret the recordings. Imagine a bunch of grumpy Norwegian drillers running the schools. You’d be bonafide if you managed to pass.
Why don’t the states up the safety regulations? They’re allowed to pass stricter requirements then the fed aren’t they? Even if they just have state inspectors using the federal standards, that would help. They could even apply a fee to the inspections so it pays for itself. Maybe not Rigs but vessels in Port and anything in State Waters.
[QUOTE=Fraqrat;160231]I’m with c.scooter the IADC needs to come up with its own STCW style training. If I have to be trained and certificated to international standards why shouldn’t they. Another good point is why isn’t there a VDR in the drill shack? Although you would then need an independent body like an FAA or NTSB to interpret the recordings. Imagine a bunch of grumpy Norwegian drillers running the schools. You’d be bonafide if you managed to pass.[/QUOTE]
Now suddenly you’re agreeing with me? Did the planet start spinning the other way round all of a sudden today? I’m so confused…
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You always make valid points and have good ideas. I’m on your side most of the time. Just like myself and everyone else you don’t know it all nor do you have all the answers.
[QUOTE=Fraqrat;160244]You always make valid points and have good ideas. I’m on your side most of the time. Just like myself and everyone else you don’t know it all nor do you have all the answers.[/QUOTE]
Normally, I’d say that you are trying to trip me up with reverse psychology but if you’re genuine about your words then I thank you for agreeing with my basis premise.
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Sometimes I use reverse psychology…in reverse…
[QUOTE=Swampfox;160247]Sometimes I use reverse psychology…in reverse…[/QUOTE]
That must make you quite the clever dick in the bars downtown…gotta be a great talent for scoring babes. Care to tell us your secrets of reversing a reversal?
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Nah, when I tell people the phrase ‘reverse psychology in reverse’, it makes one think for a minute!
The article In CC first post is interesting. It mentions Perrow who has done a lot of work on accident theory including the book “Normal Accidents”
The other important line of thought regarding complex operations is “High Reliable Organizations” which is what the company that Capt Sully, the pilot that landed in the Hudson River, is involved in.
An article critical of both approaches: Beyond Normal Accidents and High Reliability Organizations: The Need for an Alternative Approach to Safety in Complex Systems
Offshore drilling is a complex system prone to technological failures that are difficult to predict and challenging to comprehend in real-time. Drilling operations have limited slack to absorb errors; the failure of one part of the system can spread quickly to other parts, and operators cannot simply “turn off the well” while they look for a solution. Unfortunately, major accidents are nearly inevitable in these kinds of systems, as decades of research by Yale sociologist Charles Perrow has shown.
Human and organizational factors compound these challenges. A well-documented and particularly pernicious tendency of human decision-makers is to interpret evidence in a way that supports their pre-existing conclusions.
[QUOTE=Swampfox;160251]Nah, when I tell people the phrase ‘reverse psychology in reverse’, it makes one think for a minute![/QUOTE]
well that’s a boring answer…I wanted to hear about tricks to pick up women!
Here are the [five principles of a HRO](High reliability organization EditWatch this page)
Preoccupation with failure
Reluctance to simplify interpretations
Sensitivity to operations
Commitment to resilience
Deference to expertise
The failure to act on the Sims / Guide. Dancing with the stars email violates all five principles.
On April 17, 2010, BP’s Houston-based “Wells Team Leader” for the Macondo well, John Guide, e-mailed David Sims, another Houston-based BP executive and Guide’s boss:
- David, over the past four days there has been so many last minute changes to the operation that the WSL’s [BP’s rig-based Well Site Leaders] have finally come to their wits end. The quote is ‘flying by the seat of our pants.’ Moreover, we have made a special boat or helicopter run every day. Everybody wants to do the right thing, but, this huge level of paranoia from engineering leadership is driving chaos. This operation is not Thunderhorse. Brian [BP’s Brian Morel, a Houston-based engineer] has called me numerous times trying to make sense of all the insanity. Last night’s emergency evolved around the 30 [barrels] of cement spacer behind the top plug and how it would affect any bond logging (I do not agree with putting the spacer above the plug to begin with). This morning Brian called me and asked my advice about exploring opportunities both inside and outside of the company. What is my authority? With the separation of engineering and operations, I do not know what I can and can’t do. The operation is not going to succeed if we continue in this manner. (end)
The same day, David Sims responded to Guide’s e-mail.
- John, I’ve got to go to dance practice in a few minutes. Let’s talk this afternoon. . . . We’ve both [been] in Brian’s position before. The same goes for him. We need to remind him that this is a great learning opportunity, it will be over soon, and that the same issues - or worse - exist anywhere else . . . I’ll be back soon and we can talk. We’re dancing to the Village People. (end)