The industry needs to keep learning from Piper Alpha to improve safety, agreed key Piper 25 speakers.
On the final day of the commemorative conference, key industry figures, including regulators, workforce and management representatives concluded that the memories of Piper Alpha need to remain fresh as a reminder of the industry’s imperfections.
They also agreed a collaborative approach is needed to make offshore an increasingly safer work environment.
“Some Piper issues, 25 years on, are still resistant to resolution,” said Steve Walker, head of strategic interventions at the HSE’s Energy Division.
“The lessons of Piper Alpha have to remain as a reminder of what can go wrong offshore and that we all have a very great responsibility to make sure such a catastrophe does not happen again.
Malcolm Webb, chief executives of the Piper 25 organisers, Oil & Gas UK, believes the event was bound to affect the industry’s attitude to safety, but stressed that it can never become complacent about safety.
“I think people have come away from this determined to use their influence, whether they’re the leaders of organisations or they’re on the workforce, I think they all are going to be inspired by what happened today and determined to make a change,” he told Energy Voice.
“I hope we’ve learnt never to be satisfied about where we are on safety, that we’ve learnt to be constantly uneasy and determined to go on improving and that we will never be complacent about safety, because we’re dealing with people’s lives.”
