Piper Alpha oil platform explosion
06/07/1988 North Sea
Type of Fire
Gas vapour explosion
Ignition Source
Gas condensate leak
Duration
2 hours
Casualties
167 fatalities
Cost
£1.7bn+
What happened to the Piper Alpha oil platform?
On 6 July 1988 the Piper Alpha oil platform exploded and sank in the North Sea. Tragically 167 people lost their lives.
Built in 1976, Piper Alpha was once Britain's biggest single oil and gas producing platform. It produced more than 300,000 barrels of crude a day – 10% of the country's total – from below the seabed, 125 miles north-east of Aberdeen.
Oil was discovered at the Piper field in 1973 and was brought on stream three years later. By 1980 the steel platform was modified to also take gas and was connected by pipeline to the Orkney Islands. It was producing about 300,000 barrels of oil a day for Occidental Petroleum.
What caused the Piper Alpha oil platform explosion?
Poor communication during a shift change resulted in a key piece of pipework that had been sealed with a temporary cover and no safety valve being used. This allowed gas to leak out which ignited. The firewalls that would have resisted fire on an oil platform failed to cope with the gas explosion overpressures.
Flames reaching more than 100m into the air forced 61 men to jump 175 ft (53m) from the rig’s helicopter deck into the sea.
Within two hours the rig had collapsed from its position 300 ft above the surface of the sea and become a flaming pyre of twisted metal.
What can the industry learn from the Piper Alpha oil platform explosion?
A public enquiry followed and no criminal charges were brought against the company, however 106 safety recommendations for changes were made for operations in the North Sea, all of which were accepted by the oil industry.
In the years that followed the disaster oil companies spent £2bn on health and safety matters. Since this incident there has not been another North Sea blowout.