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''Alexander L. Kielland'' was a Norwegian
semi-submersible Semi-submersible may refer to a self-propelled vessel, such as: *Heavy-lift ship, which partially submerge to allow their cargo (another ship) to float into place for transport *Narco-submarine, some of which remained partially on the surface *Se ...
drilling rig A drilling rig is an integrated system that drills wells, such as oil or water wells, or holes for piling and other construction purposes, into the earth's subsurface. Drilling rigs can be massive structures housing equipment used to drill wat ...
that, on 27 March 1980,
capsized Capsizing or keeling over occurs when a boat or ship is rolled on its side or further by wave action, instability or wind force beyond the angle of positive static stability or it is upside down in the water. The act of recovering a vessel fro ...
in the
Ekofisk oil field Ekofisk is an oil field in block 2/4 of the Norwegian sector of the North Sea about southwest of Stavanger. Discovered in 1969 by Phillips Petroleum Company, it remains one of the most important oil fields in the North Sea. This was the first ...
in the
North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian S ...
, killing 123 people. The capsize was the worst disaster in Norwegian waters since the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. The rig, located approximately 320 km east of
Dundee Dundee (; sco, Dundee; gd, Dùn Dè or ) is Scotland's fourth-largest city and the 51st-most-populous built-up area in the United Kingdom. The mid-year population estimate for 2016 was , giving Dundee a population density of 2,478/km2 or ...
, Scotland, was owned by the Stavanger Drilling Company of Norway and was on hire to the U.S. company
Phillips Petroleum Phillips Petroleum Company was an American oil company incorporated in 1917 that expanded into petroleum refining, marketing and transportation, natural gas gathering and the chemicals sectors. It was Phillips Petroleum that first found oil in the ...
at the time of the disaster. The rig was named after the Norwegian writer Alexander Lange Kielland. The rig was built as a mobile drilling unit at a French shipyard, and delivered to Stavanger Drilling in July 1976. The floating drill rig was not used for drilling purposes but served as a semi-submersible 'flotel' providing living quarters for offshore workers. By 1978 additional accommodation blocks had been added to the platform, so that up to 386 persons could be accommodated. In 1980, the platform was providing offshore accommodation for the production platform ''Edda'' 2/7C. Within a few days it was scheduled to start a new contract with
Shell UK Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, England. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New Yor ...
as a drilling rig.


Accident

Early in the evening of 27 March 1980, more than 200 men were off duty in the accommodation on ''Alexander L. Kielland''. Conditions were rainy with dense fog, with the wind gusting to and waves up to high. ''Kielland'' had just been winched away from the ''Edda'' production platform. Minutes before 18:30, those on board felt a 'sharp crack' followed by 'some kind of trembling'. Suddenly ''Kielland'' heeled over 30° and then stabilised. Five of the six anchor cables had broken, the one remaining cable preventing the rig from
capsizing Capsizing or keeling over occurs when a boat or ship is rolled on its side or further by wave action, instability or wind force beyond the angle of positive static stability or it is upside down in the water. The act of recovering a vessel fro ...
. The
list A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to: People * List (surname) Organizations * List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America * SC Germania List, German rugby union ...
continued to increase and at 18:53, the remaining anchor cable snapped and the rig capsized. 130 men were in the mess hall and the cinema when the capsizing occurred. ''Kielland'' had seven 50-man
lifeboat Lifeboat may refer to: Rescue vessels * Lifeboat (shipboard), a small craft aboard a ship to allow for emergency escape * Lifeboat (rescue), a boat designed for sea rescues * Airborne lifeboat, an air-dropped boat used to save downed airmen ...
s and twenty 20-man rafts. Four lifeboats were launched, but only one managed to release from the lowering cables. (A safety device did not allow release until the strain was removed from the cables). A fifth lifeboat came adrift and surfaced upside down; its occupants righted it and gathered nineteen men from the water. Two of ''Kielland''s rafts were detached and three men were rescued from them. Two 12-man rafts were thrown from ''Edda'' and rescued thirteen survivors. Seven men were taken from the sea by supply boats and seven swam to ''Edda''. No one was rescued by the standby vessel ''Silver Pit'', which took an hour to reach the scene. Of the 212 people aboard the rig, 123 had been killed, making it the worst disaster in Norwegian offshore history since the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
and the deadliest offshore rig disaster of all time up to that point. Most of the workers were from
Rogaland Rogaland () is a Counties of Norway, county in Western Norway, bordering the North Sea to the west and the counties of Vestland to the north, Vestfold og Telemark to the east and Agder to the east and southeast. In 2020, it had a population of 47 ...
. At around 21:30 hrs. a vessel from the Dutch company Smitlloyd came on location. The crew of this vessel heard people shouting for help. Maneuvering with great caution the Smitlloyd vessel encountered a life raft from the rig and after checking this raft it was found empty. It was very difficult to get this life raft on deck so the crew let the raft go. 2 more liferafts were found by the Smitlloyd vessel and they also were found empty. The crew heard still people shouting for help but due to the dense fog nobody was seen. The Smitlloyd vessel stayed on location for several days helping the coordinated rescue operation.


Investigation

In March 1981, an investigative report concluded that ''Kielland'' collapsed due to a
fatigue crack In materials science, fatigue is the initiation and propagation of cracks in a material due to cyclic loading. Once a fatigue crack has initiated, it grows a small amount with each loading cycle, typically producing striations on some parts of ...
in one of its six bracings (bracing D-6), which connected the collapsed D-leg to the rest of the rig. This was traced to a small 6mm
fillet weld Fillet welding refers to the process of joining two pieces of metal together when they are perpendicular or at an angle. These welds are commonly referred to as tee joints, which are two pieces of metal perpendicular to each other, or lap joints, wh ...
which joined a non-load-bearing flange plate to this D-6 bracing. This flange plate held a sonar device used during drilling operations. The poor profile of the fillet weld contributed to a reduction in its fatigue strength. Further, the investigation found considerable amounts of
lamellar tearing In metalworking, a welding defect is any flaw that compromises the usefulness of a weldment. There is a great variety of welding defects. Welding imperfections are classified according to ISO 6520, while their acceptable limits are specified in IS ...
in the flange plate and cold cracks in the underlying groove weld. Cold cracks in the welds, increased stress concentrations due to the weakened flange plate, the poor weld profile, and cyclical stresses (which would be common in the
North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian S ...
) seemed to collectively play a role in the rig's collapse. Judging by paint on part of the fractured surface, the crack was probably due to improper work during the rig's construction in 1976. Other major structural elements then failed in sequence, destabilising the entire structure. The design of the rig was flawed owing to the absence of structural redundancy. ''Kielland'' was recovered in 1983 at the third attempt. The rig was scuttled later that year in the
Nedstrand Nedstrand (locally, ''Stranda'') is a village in Tysvær municipality in Rogaland county, Norway. The village is on the Nedstrand peninsula's southeast coast, at the confluence of the Nedstrandsfjorden and Vindafjorden. The village of Hindarå ...
Fjord after a search for missing bodies had been completed, as well as several tests to determine the cause of the disaster.


Consequences

In response to the ''Kielland'' disaster, North Sea offshore installations tightened their command organization, identifying a clear authority who would order abandonment in case of emergency. The fourteen minutes between initial failure of the leg and the rig's eventual capsize left a window in which most of the personnel on board could have escaped, had a more effective command structure been in place. These revised command structures, similar to conventional shipping command structures, are now frequently put into use when vessels lose anchorage in storm conditions or when fixed installations are threatened by out-of-control vessels. The failure to deploy lifeboats led to new legislation regarding on-load release hooks for lifeboats on oil rigs. As a consequence, the
International Maritime Organization The International Maritime Organization (IMO, French: ''Organisation maritime internationale'') is a specialised agency of the United Nations responsible for regulating shipping. The IMO was established following agreement at a UN conference ...
issued a requirement for all lifeboats on
merchant ships A merchant ship, merchant vessel, trading vessel, or merchantman is a watercraft that transports cargo or carries passengers for hire. This is in contrast to pleasure craft, which are used for personal recreation, and naval ships, which are us ...
to be fitted with hooks that could be released even when they were under load. A memorial to the disaster was erected in 1986 on the coast of
Kvernevik Kvernevik is a neighborhood (''delområde'') in the city of Stavanger which lies in the southwestern part of the large municipality of Stavanger in Rogaland county, Norway. It is located in the borough of Madla, located at the mouth of the Hafrsf ...
. Named "Broken Chain" ( no, brutt lenke), the memorial depicts a broken chain link. It weighs about and stands high.


Similar incidents

Not long after ''Kielland'' capsized, her sister rig, ''Henrik Ibsen'', suffered a jammed ballast valve, causing her to list twenty degrees, but was later righted again. Approximately eighteen months later, ''
Ocean Ranger ''Ocean Ranger'' was a semi-submersible mobile offshore drilling unit that sank in Canadian waters on 15 February 1982. It was drilling an exploration well on the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, east of St. John's, Newfoundland, for Mobil Oil o ...
'' capsized in similar weather conditions off the
Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
coast. An investigation into the cause of the ''Ocean Ranger'' disaster by the
United States Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, military, mult ...
established that
structural failure Structural integrity and failure is an aspect of engineering that deals with the ability of a structure to support a designed structural load (weight, force, etc.) without breaking and includes the study of past structural failures in order to ...
was not a factor.


References


External links


An animation by Failure Analysis Associates (now Exponent) Petroleum Museum, Norway
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alexander Kielland Wreck Collapsed oil platforms History of the petroleum industry in Norway Oil platforms off Norway 1980 industrial disasters Maritime incidents in 1980 1980 in Norway Man-made disasters in Norway History of the North Sea March 1980 events in Europe