SBO commemorates one-year anniversary of Pacific Osprey’s workplace incident to remember lessons learnt and re-emphasize the importance of safety.
On 23 August 2018, the crane boom of the Pacific Osprey collapsed onto the deck adjacent to the bridge. The incident caused four of our crew members to sustain injuries and serious damages to the vessel. A year later, on the exact same date, Swire Blue Ocean (SBO) organised a one-year anniversary commemoration in its Copenhagen office and on board the vessels to remember this workplace incident and its key lessons learnt.
“One year after the loss of Pacific Osprey’s boom, we learnt the lessons from what happened and put in place measures so that it never happens again, says Mikkel Gleerup, CEO, SBO. We came out stronger and turned this regrettable incident into an opportunity to improve our vessel, safety practices and organisation. This commemoration was first and foremost an opportunity to re-emphasize the importance of safety, go through what we achieved over the year from our learnings and then look forward, all together and safely.”
Building a strong common safety culture
As is the case with all companies operating Windfarm Installation Vessels (WIV) in Northern Europe, Swire Blue Ocean has maintained a high level of compliance with health and safety standards and has fully updated certifications and management systems. As SBO has learned, even the best procedures and compliance with all requirements for marine operations are not always enough to create a safety culture in which zero incidents are a reality.
Based on the learnings from the incident and the current project execution activities and cooperation with client and contractors, SBO has developed an HSEQ improvement plan for 2019-2020, aiming at addressing the key areas where SBO and client/contractors, as part of the project execution, can improve in our common effort to prevent incidents.
The SBO HSEQ improvement plan 2019-2020 is focusing on reinforcing basic HSEQ controls, increasing control of client and contractor activities on vessels, strengthening organisation and structure, and developing and performing a Safety Leadership training.
“We need to push beyond compliance with industry safety standards and instil a culture of safety which motivates the actions of each and every individual working within the scope of his and her own accountability so that everyone can Get Home Safe”, says Jacob Heinricy Jensen, Head of HSEQ, SBO.
At SBO’s office in Copenhagen, a statue titled “Resilience”, made from a part of the girder in the tip end of the boom, has been unveiled to mark the Pacific Osprey's workplace incident (see the main picture).
Jacob Heinricy Jensen, Head of HSEQ, SBO: “We need to push beyond compliance with industry safety standards and instil a culture of safety which motivates the actions of each and every individual (...)."