A reliable safety net

Just complying with standards doesn't go far enough, says Jaakko Uotila.

“Whether it's about running the daily routines, planning maintenance operations, or organising transport, there are risks that need to be minimised”
-Jaakko Uotila

A recent finding in Trelleborg, Sweden, paints a gloomy picture of how safe is safe. A routine check revealed that several Swedish passenger ferries carried life buoys that did not float. Instead, they soaked up water and sunk. Surprisingly, the defect life buoys had been approved as meeting the European safety standards, arguably not among the weakest in the world. Looking at this striking shortcoming as a manufacturer of safety equipment, there is only one conclusion to be made: fulfilling standards is not enough. Instead, we should always look at real-life safety needs.

In offshore structures, safety is always an issue. Whether it's about running the daily routines, planning maintenance operations, or organising transport, there are risks that need to be minimised. Safety standards already govern the majority of offshore safety equipment. For the perimeter safety nets used on helidecks, there are a great variety of standards in different markets, from professional regulations to virtually non-existent recommendations. Even today, many territories accept perimeter nets that are tested by dropping sand bags into the nets. The belief is that this concludes whether the net holds or not. Unfortunately, drop tests will not reveal whether the net holds a weight any heavier than the bag, or even the same bag again. It's hard to imagine anyone volunteering to do a test-jump into the corroded or ragged perimeter nets, even if they have just been drop tested.

Resisting abrasion

Safety of helideck perimeter nets is determined by design, material and installment method. In offshore conditions, the nets need to survive a combination of sun, rain, ice, salt water and guano. Safety nettings of poor design or made of poor materials may well comply with regulations at start, but fall below their specifications surprisingly quickly. Due to the inadequate testing while in use, deterioration often goes unnoticed. Frequent renewal of safety nettings is arguably the best way to uphold safety. However, offshore installation projects tend to be difficult and expensive. As the cost of installation often exceeds the cost of equipment, there is often a temptation to wait for another year, maybe two. Based on more than a decade of research and development of helideck safety nets, we have proven that the typical lifespan of just one to two years can be extended to up to nine to 10 years by using high quality materials and careful design.

Improved testing is a must

In order to ensure offshore personnel that their work environment has been made as safe as possible, regardless of where in the world they operate, more stringent and more widely adopted standards are strongly called for. I have been delighted to note that there are efforts ongoing to improve standards and harmonise the requirements across territories. The pioneering work done by the North Sea authorities will hopefully lead to similar actions in other regions.

In safety nettings, the key to long-term safety is balanced structure and strength. Nettings should keep their form and structure, and the installation method should ensure correct operation. A crucial part of upholding the safety of helideck nettings is to regularly test the materials for remaining strength. A testing method used in North Sea for some years already is to include extra straps in the nettings. Test straps can be then detached in regular intervals and sent to labs. Results tell the exact current strength of the material, and comparing them with long-term field testing data and textile engineering theory enables the estimation of the net's remaining lifetime. There are talks about safety products that can simply be installed and forgotten. In my opinion, saying something like that is outright irresponsible.

BIO       

Jaakko Uotila is the Managing Director of Frictape Net Ltd, the producer of ultra-safe Frictape landing and perimeter nettings designed for offshore helidecks. Frictape Nets feature a completely balanced structure and hold DNV-type approval certificates. Frictape Net customers include BP, Conoco Phillips, ExxonMobil, Shell and Statoil Hydro.