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Piper Alpha exploded and collapsed under the effect of sustained gas jet fires in the night between 6 and 7 July 1988, killing 165 of the men on board (30 of whose bodies were never recovered), as well as a further two rescuers. [4] . Sixty-one workers escaped and survived.
Late in the evening of 06 July 1988, a series of explosions ripped through the Piper Alpha platform in the North Sea. Engulfed in fire, over the next few hours most of the oil rig topside modules collapsed into the sea. 167 men died and many more were injured and traumatised.
Piper Alpha disaster, explosion and sinking of the Piper Alpha oil platform in the North Sea on July 6, 1988. The disaster killed 167 people. The discovery of North Sea oil and gas was a boon to Great Britain.
Oct 17, 2019 · Probable causes. In November 1988, a public inquiry was set up to determine the cause under the chairmanship of William Cullen. The establishment of exact causes was not easy, as nobody from the senior members of Piper Alpha’s management team survived.
Feb 19, 2020 · On the 6th July, 1988, safety lapses aboard the Piper Alpha oil rig resulted in a series of devastating explosions. (1,2) This and related process safety accidents are well-known among chemical engineers, (3) but less so among chemists.
With 167 fatalities, Piper Alpha is the deadliest accident in the history of the offshore oil and gas industry. There have been numerous articles, reports and documentaries coving the incident, possibly the best summary of the incident and the events leading up to it are contained in the Cullen Report.
In 1988, Piper Alpha endured a gas leak with the subsequent fire and explosion reducing her to a wreck, ending up on the bottom of the North Sea. In the following sections we will examine the causes of the Piper Alpha oil rig explosion and the subsequent inquiry into the incident that claimed 167 crew member’s lives.
