Aging assets and life extension are consuming ever more engineering hours in the offshore oil and gas industry. How can engineering tools help? Meg Chesshyre looks for answers. Image from Petrofac…
One person has died and two more were injured after a breaking wave hit the COSL Innovator semisubmersible drilling rig around 5pm local time on 30 December, Statoil announced. The rig, which is under contract with Statoil for the Troll field in the North Sea…
Houston-based BOP Technologies announced a new approach to allow a BOP to work even if the drilling rig loses power or hydraulic pressure. The company calls it 'a huge step' toward making BOPs the last line of defense in case of a blowout…
Barge Master launched its motion compensated gangway. The model 3.0 compensates vessel motions in significant wave heights (Hs) up to 3m by actively telescoping, slewing and luffing the bridge. Tip compensation allows for landing on an offshore facility…
Ben Lake, of Weatherford, discusses how rigorous testing and validation are essential for ensuring safety valve reliability and performance. As the last line of defense in protecting life, property, and the environment, subsurface safety…
Cyberhawk Innovations completed its first ROAV inspection of a cargo oil tank on an operational floating, production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel. The inspection took place on board the Gryphon FPSO, owned and operated by Maersk Oil in the UK North Sea…
Learning from incidents is easier said than done. Edward Smith and Richard Roels, of DNV GL, give guidance on how to maximize learning from incidents, accidents and other events. Photos from DNV GL…
Mark Stevens and Bob Moschetta, of Oceaneering, discuss the benefits of using augmented reality for subsea training. The augmented reality view combines the real-time video with the 3D model, which allows operations to occur in real time…
Retrieving an unreliable blowout preventer (BOP) is a necessary but expensive operation, costing upwards of US$1-2 million dollars. This cost can easily escalate in developing ultra deepwater regions such as Brazil, West Africa and Gulf of Mexico…
Ice cover in the far north isn’t static, but varies in extent with the seasons and from year to year. Thanks to the Gulf Stream, the southern Barents Sea is usually ice-free all year round, but icebergs and sea ice can pose a real threat to installations if they collide…
Honeywell Process Solutions (HPS) has announced an enhancement to its UniSim design and simulation software designed to help manufacturing facilities improve safety and reduce capital expenditures for both new and existing installations. The new UniSim Design Blowdown Utility…
An accident onboard the drillship Pacific Santa Ana has left one worker dead. The news was confirmed by the US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), operator Chevron, and the drillship's owner, Pacific Drilling. The Pacific…
More than 40 items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) from World War II have been safely detonated or removed from the Norfolk coast, having been discovered on the export cable route for DONG Energy’s Race Bank offshore wind farm. Image…
Gregory Hale explains how avoidable downtime costs producers billions of dollars every year, with equipment failures being the most common culprit. Engineers remotely monitor all aspects of oil production…
Baker Hughes released its DeepShield deepwater safety valve, the industry’s first V1-validated subsurface safety valve tested to help ensure fail-safe operations as defined in the new API Spec 14A. DeepShield…