HSE publishes full offshore health and safety statistics 2008/09

Date:

17 December 2009

Release No:

115/2009

Full and finalised offshore health and safety statistics for 2008/09 are now available on the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) website.

The detailed report follows the release of 'headline' statistics in August and contains figures on injury, ill-health and dangerous occurrences (see Notes to editors), including hydrocarbon releases, between 1 April 2008 and 31 March 2009.

No workers were killed while working offshore during 2008/09 - the second consecutive year with no fatalities - and there was a fall in major injuries with 30 reported, a fall of 14 compared with 2007/08 figures.

The combined fatal and major injury rate reduced to 106 per 100,000 workers in 2008/09 compared with 156 in 2007/08 and 146 in 2006/07. The highest number of injuries occurred during maintenance and construction work.

The number of major and significant hydrocarbon releases, regarded as potential precursors to a major incident, also showed marked improvement with 61 in 2008/09 compared with 74 in 2007/08.

In 2008/09 there was a small fall in the three-day injury rate with 496 workers per 100,000 reporting an injury, bucking the broadly flat trend over the previous seven years.

Said Steve Walker, HSE's head of offshore:

"Though these figures suggest the sector is getting safer, with both the combined fatal and major injury rate and major hydrocarbon releases at their lowest since HSE began regulating the industry, they cannot be taken in isolation. The tragic loss on 1 April 2009 of 17 workers in two separate air transport and maritime incidents - areas not regulated by HSE - is a stark reminder of the hazards of working offshore and the need to ensure they are carefully managed.

"However, while continuing to work to minimise the potential for large-scale incidents, the offshore industry must not forget the risks to workers from every day activities such as lifting and carrying and maintenance work which were responsible for the vast majority of all offshore injuries during 2008/09."

The offshore injury, ill health and incident statistics report 2008/09 can be downloaded free from the HSE website at: www.hse.gov.uk/offshore/statistics.htm

Notes to editors

1. A 'dangerous occurrence' (DO) is defined in Regulation 2(1) of The Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences regulations 1995 (RIDDOR '95) and essentially arises out of, or in connection with, work activity and causes or has the potential to cause death or harm to individuals or impair plant or structural integrity. For offshore installations, this relates to DO Types 1 -17 and 73 - 83 in Schedule 2 of the regulations. 'Major injury' is defined in regulation 2(1) and Schedule 1 of RIDDOR '95.
2. HSE does not hold responsibility for air and marine transport activities and the statistics do not include incidents reported in these industries.
3. This is the ninth report in a series of HID Statistics reports covering offshore injury and incident statistics, which continues from the previous OTO series. It is the thirteenth report produced since RIDDOR '95 were introduced offshore.
4. The report contains graphs plotting injury rates since 1995/96 and tables breaking down injuries by type; part of body injured; age of injured person, etc, plus cases of ill health reported since 1998/99. Details of reported dangerous occurrences are also given.
5. Previously, pre-1996/97 statistics were not directly comparable with later figures, due to changes of definitions introduced by RIDDOR '95 - particularly the definitions of major injuries. However, a review of pre-96/97 data to reclassify injuries, in line with RIDDOR '95, means that all figures in the latest report can be compared.
6. Provisional headline figures were previously published on 5th August 2009 in HSE's Offshore Safety Bulletin.

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