From the Sublime to the Ridiculous

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Originally Posted by Terry Bryce

167 men lost their lives due to the Piper Alpha disaster including my cousin, to mention and use the argument of the lack of safety equipment on standby boats in the same context is disrespectful.

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Terry no one here who has posted in my time of being a member on this forum has ever to my knowledge shown any disrespect to those who lost there lives on the Piper Alpha. Perhaps an apology should be forth coming to those who manned Standby /support vessels and did there absolute best to rescue as many as possible using equipment that greedy owners reluctantly provided only because they were forced to. As usual all an owner ever does is put profits first. At the end of the day it was greed and no one having the balls to make the decision to shut the Rig down when they knew ashore they had a problem.

When I lived in the UK my next door neighbour was an ex fire chief from Plymouth. During the war before going into the fire service he had been a landing craft tank operator and took part in the Normandy Invasion. His name was John Fiddaman and died a number of years ago. However we used to natter quite often. And he once said to me, I admire you blokes you know, when you come. On these 2 or 3 day courses we push you as much as we can, the same amount of information we would take a couple of months with our rookies. I took that as a compliment, but it also shows that a lot we were told wasn’t there to be retained for long periods of time. A professional fireman lives with his calling day by day. Seamen don’t. They know enough to protect basically themselves and ship. JS...

Malcom 40, while i was serving in Portsmouth Fire service, circa 1977-8, had many a happy!!!, hour training on that site, as a matter of fact an Uncle of mine drew the plans for that place, plus a lot of ship training on HMS Bulwark, which was in mothballs and ideal for BA training, kt

I appreciate your comments Lewis, what I took exception to was that the originator of the thread called the standby boat a 'safety vessel' and then lists the lack of equipment such as gas detectors? first and foremost the primary function of the standby boat at any rig or platform was in case of a 'man overboard' scenario, when a chopper was due or work was taking place under the rig then the standby boat was called in close to the platform or rig, these boats were in the main old fishing boats and the North Sea was the only area worldwide where they were utilised. To indicate that these boats could have done more if they had more safety equipment is ridiculous, if you have experienced a high pressure blowout you will know that the resulting noise eliminates normal comms plus the intense heat from the fire made close quarter recovery impossible.
I do know that there were guys from standby boats lost on that terrible night which the thread author did not mention as he was more intent on listing safety equipment.
The exception I take is the implication that the lack of safety equipment on the standby boats somehow added to the disaster.
By all means make a case against the shipowner but do not use the loss of 167 men to enforce the argument, that as I said is disrespectful.

A couple of footnotes, on that night I was listening in to Aberdeen Coastguards radio trans and it was bedlam, especially one American who was cutting in with obscure requests which had nothing to do with Piper Alpha.
My cousin was one of the last to be found, he was an Oxy employee and like many was probably waiting for instruction over the PA, sadly that system was one of the first casualties.
The Tartan and Claymore kept pumping, the Claymore OIM would not shutdown until he was instructed to do so by his office.
I know how it was for the Standby boat crews, there were Christmas's where they had no festive food and we lowered goodies down to them as we did many times with newspapers and videos.

I think perhaps Mr Bryce that you should be told that the Thread Originator as you put it, was in fact the Captain of the ' Safety / Stand-by Boat " Silver Pit " on duty alongside Piper Alpha when it experienced the High Pressure Blowout - he would at that time also be very well aware of the lack of equipment he would have desired to have had on board in such circumstances, as to assist the rescue mission. I see nothing ' disrespectful ' in him observing that the presence of such equipment on board, may well have saved further lives.

As an addition to the above, he and his crew saved many lives at that horrific incident, kt

##this appears to be the old statement ......LETS SHOOT THE MESSENGER cappy

I think that would have been said about the Piper Alpha incident on here from JS is probably one of the most honest heart-wrenching things that I have ever read and ever grateful for reading the truth I wouldn't like the nightmares that must go with it

I think to give Terry Bryce the benefit of the doubt, he may not be aware of John Sabourne efforts at that incident , but if he looks back using the search button, there is a full account from himself, with all the official reports into his actions, on that terrible time. it would be an interesting read, kt

Let me make it absolute clear. If Mr Bryce would like to confirm the name of his cousin I will check the list of names I have of both the survivors and the dead ones. I notice on mr Bryce’s initial joining form there is no mention of being a seaman ,or any other information about himself, which brings back the query of other visitors who have frequented this site in the past. However if genuine complaint I Can live with it, Informatipn I put on here was for seamen as I think they have a right to know the real story and not bits and pieces from the ever magnifying press. My remarks on this site are my own and don’t come from google. I would not speak openly about the disaster for over 10 years and one of the reasons was just so for upsetting relatives. However I find it hard to believe that for someone who was not even there , and still bearing grief for a cousin is hard to believe after 30 years. PLease give his name and will check the names I have to see if there is any relevant information. Although if that upsets you also just don’t bother reading. Maybe if you find the grief too hard you should see a councillor. It’s no good posting to me either, all correspondence should be addressed to the site. I hope you read Lewis post on why the fire lasted so long that it penetrated that it was the cause of a lot of unnecessary deaths . The 167 deaths you so easily mention also include 2 seamen, which would have been more but for the hand of God. The biggest factor to a safety vessel is crew, anyone who thinks that they are well manned in numbers for jobs like the PA doesn’t know his ass from his elbow. JS