The project concentrates on all aspects of safety on installations, both offshore and on land, and focuses on all the conditions that affect the work’s nature and framework conditions. This entails, among other things, focusing on corporate culture, structure, organisation and management.

The project aims to:

- improve safety in the oil and gas industry
- reduce the risk of personal injury and major accidents
- improve the employees' and their family's trust of the industry
- strengthen trust and cooperation between industry players
- improve the industry’s reputation

To draw attention to, and reduce the number of, unwanted incidents, Mintra has developed 10 visualisations, over the course of 2007.  The visualisations are based on real incidents and have been published on the homepage for Working Together for Safety, www.samarbeidforsikkerhet.no, both in Norwegian and English language versions.

Erik Wiig is the Project Manager at Working Together for Safety.  He has previously been the HSE Director at Shell Norway and, over the course of his 28 years in the Norwegian offshore industry, has accumulated a wealth of knowledge of unwanted incidents and accident reports.

Erik Wiig, Project manager, Working together for safety (Photo: SfS)

Investigate to Learn
Wiig focuses on the importance of investigating incidents.  He emphasises that the reason for investigating incidents is to learn from them, not just to keep statistics accurate.

“We have refined and adapted technical information for the visualisations, making them accessible to the entire target group, not just for those who read incident reports.  Logging statistics on incidents is certainly important, but learning from incidents to avoid similar incidents in the future, is our primary focus,” points out Wiig.

All the visualisations follow the same pattern, answering the following questions:
• What happened?
• Why did it happen?
• How can we keep this from happening again?

By using a fixed structure, it is easy to see what went wrong and why, as well has what we can do to avoid similar incidents.

Erik Wiig emphasises that it is particularly important to illustrate the underlying causes of unwanted incidents.  “By being alert and understanding the root causes, we are well equipped to avoid repeat incidents.  We have to learn from history, while also being vigilant, to avoid similar incidents from happening again.  Only through learning and knowledge on all levels in the organisation can we ensure safe operations.”

“Unwanted incidents always have the potential to escalate and, often, we don’t even realise the potential scope of the incident at the time.  Generally, it doesn’t take much to avoid unwanted incidents.  As a rule, it is enough just to stop and think twice.  Then, it is crucial to feel secure enough and knowledgeable enough in a potentially hazardous situation.” 

“We see enormous benefits in visualising unwanted incidents, and making accident reports accessible to a broader audience.  So far, we have received extremely positive feedback and see that the petroleum industry outside of Europe is also showing interest in our productions.  Among others, ConocoPhillips in China has been making inquires.  We will be continuing with new productions in 2008 and expect great interest – and a reduction in the number of unwanted incidents,” says Erik Wiig.

Article by: Nina S. Krogh, Mintra as