The Weekly Reflektion 48/2024
Reflekt will organise a breakfast seminar Wednesday 27th November. In the seminar we will consider what the offshore petroleum industry can learn from the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017.
The seminar will be held at the Quality Hotel Pond in Forus from 0800 to 1000. A light breakfast will be served beforehand. There is plenty of free parking at and around the hotel. Please let us know if you would like to attend.
Every so often, we are informed of an incident, and immediately recognise the similarities with other incidents that we know about. Sometimes the details are almost identical, and we wonder whether they are actually the same incident but the names are mixed up. We have to be careful and not make too many assumptions. Even though theincidents may look similar we need to dig deeper as the causes may be different. Sometimes however, the causes are just the same.
Did you just have a déjà vu experience?
On 11th December 2005, a fire broke out at the Buncefield oil storage terminal in Hemel Hempstead in England. There was a massive explosion followed by a series of minor explosions and a major fire. The cause of the fire was the basis for a Weekly Reflektion week 7/2019, the emergency response was covered in week 43/2019 and the pressures that led to poor decision making was highlighted in week 49/2020. The fire at Buncefield provides a substantial basis for learning and experience transfer. Unfortunately, the management at the Catano oil refinery were either unaware of Buncefield or failed to learn.
On October 23rd, 2009, there was an explosion and fire at the Caribbean Petroleum Corporation (CAPECO) oil refinery and oil depot in Bayamón, Puerto Rico. The fires were eventuallyextinguished on October 25th. Luckily there were no fatalities, but 3 people were injured and more were affected by fumes and evacuation. 110,000 m3 of gasoline was spilled into thewetlands of the San Juan Bay, resulting in dead wildlife and a major health impact to the population.
During transfer of gasoline from the vessel Cape Bruny, tank 409 overflowed resulting in a vapour cloud that covered 0,45 km2. The cloud spread before being ignited, most likely byfaulty electrical equipment in the wastewater treatment plant. During the operation several tanks were lined up, and the operators lost control of which valves were open and which tanks were being filled. At least two valves had to be open to prevent overpressure of the filling line. The tank side gauge on tank 409 used for monitoring levels was faulty and there was no independent high-level alarm. The tanks on site were not equipped with an independent system for terminating filling operations on a tank high-level. There was insufficient lighting that hindered the operators in both observing the tank and the subsequent vapour cloud. The local fire department lacked sufficient firefighting equipment and had not trained their personnel for fires involving multiple tanks. There was also a lack of coordination between the different organisations that responded to the fires.
The CAPECO tank fire was less than four years after the Buncefield tank fire. We can only speculate on whether a detailed review of Buncefield by Caribbean Petroleum would have led to measures at the CAPECO tank terminal that would have prevented the overflow and fire or led to a better response. Speculation is however not a luxury you have; it is your responsibility to find out about relevant incidents and learn.