An unmanned barge drifting out of control past a North Sea oil field sparked a major scare.
BP and ConocoPhillips were forced to evacuate platforms and shut down production early on Hogmanay amid concerns they could be hit by a drifting barge that had broken its anchor.
Winds gusting at 70 knots had ripped the barge from its moorings and sent it towards BP’s Valhall platform in the Norwegian sector of the North Sea, close to the meridian line with UK sector.
This prompted the oil and gas company to shut down output and take the decision to evacuate all 235 personnel on board.
ConocoPhillips also stopped production and removed crew from installations in the same sector.
The barge, owned by Norwegian firm Eide Marine, had been under tow in the Dutch sector further south when it broke loose in a storm on Wednesday, said Anders Bang Andersen, a spokesman for Norway’s Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre.
He said the barge drifted past the Valhall field at a distance of about a mile, avoiding what could have been a disastrous collision with an oil rig.
“The barge is unusually tall, more than three storeys,” Mr Bang Andersen said.
It is not yet clear when the platforms will return to normal production levels.
A BP spokesman said last night: “We have many wells and it is complication. We have a comprehensive procedure involved in starting and stopping production – it would normally take a couple of days.
“I could not say now how long it will take.”
Nobody was available from ConocoPhillips to comment.
The drama unfolded just a day after a 53-year-old man, who worked for Aker Solutions, died when a freak wave struck the drilling rig COSL Innovator.
The rig was on contract to Statoil in the Troll field west of Bergen when the accident happened. Two other personnel were injured and were treated for the injuries by medical teams in Norway.
Last night a spokeswoman for Aker Solutions said the man, believed to be a Norwegian, would not be named “out of consideration for his family”.