NADL faces order over safety faults on West Phoenix rig

Norway’s offshore safety agency, the Petroleum Safety Authority Norway (PSA), has given North Atlantic Drilling Limited (NADL) a notice of an order following a number of nonconformities and improvement points revealed during an audit of the West Phoenix rig.

Conducted on January 9 – 11, 2018, the supervisory activity with NADL and the West Phoenix drilling rig focused on emergency preparedness, logistics, maintenance and working environment, the PSA informed on Monday.

West Phoenix is a Moss Maritim CS50 design and was built at the Samsung yard in South Korea. Operated by NADL, it received an acknowledgement of compliance from the PSA in 2008.

The rig has operated over a lengthy period on the UK continental shelf. It now has a contract with Wintershall Norge to conduct drilling operations on production license 894 in the Norwegian Sea.

The goal of the audit was to verify compliance with the regulatory requirements for emergency preparedness, logistics, maintenance management, worker participation and the working environment.

The audit identified a number of nonconformities and improvement points in several areas of NADL’s management of health, safety and the environment on West Phoenix.

On the basis of the findings made in the audit, the PSA has given NADL notice of the order, instructing the company to implement measures, including review the company’s management and associated work processes intended to ensure follow-up and correction of technical, operational and organizational faults and deficiencies.

The agency noted that this work must include an analysis of why deficiencies in the management system, organizational conditions and technical requirements in the regulations have not been identified and corrected on West Phoenix.

NADL was also ordered to implement measures intended to ensure that results of and lessons learnt are also extended to cover all facilities holding an AoC within NADL’s area of responsibility in Norway.

A scheduled plan for complying with the order must be submitted to the PSA no later than March 2, 2018. This plan must describe how the work is to be carried out and followed up, and when the order will be complied with.

Based on the findings made in the audit, the PSA has also decided to give Wintershall notice of an audit of the operator company’s qualification and follow-up of West Phoenix.