[BITList] SMH Story 30.9.11

[franka]

  *Oil workers' deaths still a mystery *


          *Leonie Wood*

/September 30, 2011/
Some of the crew of the Trinity II lifeboat
Some of the crew of the Trinity II lifeboat.
*What caused a vessel to leave 10 men fighting for their lives in stormy 
seas remains unclear, writes Leonie Wood. *
Fremantle-based Mermaid Marine is one of three companies accused of 
actions ''tantamount to murder at sea'' in a US lawsuit filed by the 
family of one of four oil workers who died last month during a violent 
storm in the Gulf of Mexico.
Two of the six men who survived the catastrophe have also filed lawsuits 
alleging ASX-listed Mermaid Marine Australia and US companies 
Geokinetics Inc and Trinity Liftboat Services were grossly negligent.
They claim the crew of Mermaid Vigilance, one of Mermaid Marine's fleet 
which was contracted to provide services to Houston-based Geokinetics, 
turned for shore instead of helping the oil workers as they abandoned 
the disabled Trinity II mobile platform on September 8.
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The Trinity II lifeboat.
The Trinity II lifeboat.
They contend the Mermaid Vigilance's action in deserting the workers was 
both cowardly and intentional, and they allege Geokinetics was the 
''ringleader''.
One of the workers who died was Aaron Houweling, 33, from Narangba in 
south-east Queensland .
Mr Houweling drowned after shedding his life vest and pushing himself 
away from the tiny cork life raft that represented the last hope of 
survival for the oil workers.
His body was not found until September 16 after an extensive search by 
the Mexican navy, the state-owned oil producer, Petroleos Mexicanos 
(Pemex), various cargo ships and oil industry support vessels.
For three fearful days, in torrential rains and pounding waves, the men 
clung to the sides of the life raft as it was whipped into open seas in 
swift currents.
Without food or water, without any form of emergency beacons or 
communications devices, and with no survival suits to protect them from 
the wind and the wet, three other workers either drowned or died of 
hypothermia.
The survivors drank their own urine to slake their raging thirst. They 
feared sharks, became delusional and had to urge each other to hang on.
When the hapless raft was finally spotted on September 11, it had 
drifted more than 200 kilometres. In its webbed centre was the body of 
Craig Myers, a slight young man from Louisiana . His colleague Nick 
Reed, the son of the president of Trinity Liftboat Services, Randy Reed, 
had also died. Kham Nadimuzzaman of Bangladesh died soon after he was 
rescued.
Exactly who bears responsibility for the tragedy is one of the issues 
likely to be decided in the US District Court in Houston next year.
Mermaid Marine is involved in some of the biggest oil and gas 
exploration and production operations in Australia , including Chevron's 
Gorgon project.
It has substantial bases at Dampier and Broome providing marine supplies 
for oil and gas companies operating off the north-west coast of Western 
Australia .
Mermaid Marine, which says it is Australia 's biggest provider of 
marine-based services to the oil and gas industry, has the slogan 
''Safety is our Priority''.
It confirmed in a statement to the ASX on Wednesday that claims had been 
made against it and other parties in the US District Court for the 
Southern District of Texas. It said it had notified its insurers of the 
allegations which it denies, and which it will defend.
Mermaid Vigilance, a 70-metre vessel conducting seismic work in the 
relatively shallow waters in the southern reaches of the Gulf, also 
served as a standby vessel for workers who were stationed on a portable 
jack-up platform or ''liftboat'' called the Trinity II, which stores 
supplies for offshore oil operations.
In its ASX statement, Mermaid Marine said none of the four workers who 
died were employed by it, and they were not on a Mermaid Marine vessel.
The managing director of Mermaid Marine, Jeff Weber, said in the 
statement: ''We are deeply saddened by the tragic loss of the four 
personnel and our thoughts and sympathies are with their families, 
friends and colleagues.''
The company has sent a team to Mexico to investigate the incident.
The 29-metre Trinity II was a substantial structure, weighing some 185 
tonnes, but on the morning of September 8, as tropical storm Nate 
developed into a cyclone, one of Trinity II's support legs collapsed.
So dire was the situation that the 10 workers believed it was better to 
abandon the platform than stay on the crippled structure.
The Vigilance was nearby and had been in constant communication over 
several hours as Captain Jeremy Parfait on the Trinity II urged the 
vessel to come closer and pick up the workers.
But for reasons that are far from clear, the vessel turned for shore. In 
its statement, Mermaid Marine said the Vigilance was carrying a total of 
30 crew and passengers when it was caught in the storm that produced 
wind gusts up to 93 knots and waves in excess of 20 metres in height.
''The master of the vessel was forced to take evasive action to protect 
the personnel on board,'' Mermaid Marine told the ASX.
It is not clear if the Trinity II workers were already in the water at 
that point but they were certainly in peril, not least because the 
canister-style inflatable life rafts blew away before the workers could 
deploy them into the ocean.
Instead they took to a tiny cork life raft that had an inflatable rim. 
The central area of the raft was webbed with netting to hold supplies, 
but the raft was not capable of supporting 10 men.
Some of the workers tethered themselves to the life raft and
others hung to the sides as storm winds gusted to more than 100km/h and 
the ocean currents intensified.
The Mexican navy and Pemex sent helicopters and planes and the workers 
initially were sighted about 13 kilometres offshore.
But conditions deteriorated before they could be rescued.
Cargo ships and oil support vessels were swung into the search and on 
September 11 a ship located seven of the workers.
In documents filed with the court, the two US survivors and the Myers 
family claimed Mermaid Marine and Geokinetics jointly controlled the 
Vigilance, but that the vessel's name was ''a contradiction'' in terms 
of what happened.
''The vessel abandoned the crew of the Trinity II to their horrifying 
fate in the storm ridden seas of the Bay of Campeche , and cut and ran 
for base and shelter,'' the plaintiffs allege. ''All of these actions 
took place with the full knowledge of the circumstances of the Trinity 
II's crew's horrifying position, given the collapse of the Trinity II's 
leg, and despite her 'mayday' calls.
''These intentional and conscious actions, and inactions, constitute 
negligence and gross negligence as those terms are defined in law and 
morality, or were intentional acts as the injuries and deaths were 
substantially certain to be caused by the actions and/or omissions of 
Mermaid and/or Geokinetics.''
The Myers family and the two survivors allege the actions by the 
Vigilance vessel were ''anything but vigilant, but rather cowardly and 
tantamount to murder at sea'' and that they were done ''in conjunction 
with'' Geokinetics.
They argue that Geokinetics was ''the ringleader of these conscious 
decisions to doom the crew of the Trinity II to their deaths and 
horrifying and debilitating injuries''. Attempts by BusinessDay to speak 
with Geokinetics were unsuccessful.
It is claimed Mr Myers suffered ''severe and disabling personal 
injuries, mental anguish and pain and suffering before dying three days 
later, while floating with his fellow crew members, abandoned in high 
seas in the Bay of Campeche ''.
Frank Spagnoletti, the Houston lawyer representing the two survivors and 
the Myers family, said while the lawsuits sought financial damages, the 
main issue was to ensure the entire industry paid closer attention to 
safety issues.
''Obviously they have filed them for a number of reasons,'' Mr 
Spagnoletti told BusinessDay. ''They saw these guys, that they were 
working with, dying, and they do not want it to happen again. They don't 
want their deaths to be meaningless.
''If they can compel the smallest change - to have survival suits made 
compulsory, or to have an extra $US300 spent per man for individual 
EPIRBs [emergency position indicating radio beacons] - that would help 
how men or women are treated in the workplace.''
Mr Spagnoletti conceded mistakes happened in the workplace, but he said 
the procedures in this case were especially inadequate and, so far at 
least, inexplicable.
He argued that the most basic rule of maritime decency was broken when 
the Vigilance did not stand by and mark the position of the workers as 
they floated in the roiling seas.
''While the companies might be first-world, the circumstances are not 
always first-world,'' he said.


Read more: 
http://www.smh.com.au/business/oil-workers-deaths-still-a-mystery-20110929-1kze0.html#ixzz1ZOTtK3VT
Sydney Morning Herald 30/9/11

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