The Offshore Installation Manager (OIM) is the most senior manager of an

offshore platform An oil platform (or oil rig, offshore platform, oil production platform, and similar terms) is a large structure with facilities to extract and process petroleum and natural gas that lie in rock formations beneath the seabed. Many oil platfor ...

operating on the UKCS. Many offshore operators have adopted this UK offshore management model and title and applied it to their operations in all global regions irrespective of the local regulations in force. In the UK the individual must be officially registered as an OIM with the Offshore Safety Division of the

Health and Safety Executive The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is a UK government agency responsible for the encouragement, regulation and enforcement of workplace health, safety and welfare, and for research into occupational risks in Great Britain. It is a non-depar ...

and the OIM is responsible for the health, welfare and safety of the personnel on board the installation, whether a

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 ...

production platform An oil platform (or oil rig, offshore platform, oil production platform, and similar terms) is a large structure with facilities to extract and process petroleum and natural gas that lie in rock formations beneath the seabed. Many oil platfor ...

or a support vessel (e.g. a flotel). The OIM position had arisen in part from the Inquiry into the 1965

Sea Gem ''Sea Gem'' was the first British jack-up oil rig, known for its collapse off the coast of Lincolnshire on 27 December 1965, after two of its steel support legs buckled and the rig capsized, resulting in 13 fatalities. Background In ...

disaster, in which the ''Sea Gem'' drilling rig collapsed and sank in the southern sector of the North Sea with a loss of 13 lives. The Inquiry recommended that " ... there ought to be a 'master' or unquestioned authority on these rigs" and that " ... there ought to be the equivalent of a shipmaster's daily round when the 'master' could question those responsible for different aspects of the day-to-day management of the whole." The recommendations from the Sea Gem Inquiry were formalised in the Mineral Workings (Offshore Installations) Act 1971 which requires a registered OIM to be in charge of each installation. Training and selection of OIMs has been the subject of research projects and specialist training.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Oim (Offshore Installation Manager) Resource extraction occupations Petroleum production

See also

References