Subsea UK the body reperesenting the British underwater industry is today launching a set of rules to secure safety across the whole industry. The Common Induction Framework should reduce accidents and improve safety performance through a greater understanding of the risks and what is required and so help the UK keep its market leading position.

After the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf last year, the government looked at the UK oil rig and underwater industry as a whole to see if lessons could be learned. The new scheme is part of the industry’s own response and is the first in a series of best practice initiatives that will be rolling out to improve safety through industry-wide collaboration.

Chief executive of Subsea UK, Alistair Birnie, said: “This is a major step forward in the industry’s collaborative approach to safety and is targeted at further improving performance across the sector. By coming together, they have identified the best of what is being done by individual organisations and combined this into a single induction framework that will be available to everyone working on a subsea project.”

The subsea sector operates in one of the most mission-critical and challenging environments of any in the oil and gas industry. Recent statistics on subsea-related incidents reveal that a substantial number of reported incidents are related to sub-contractor personnel.The framework will ensure that everyone working offshore, onshore or on-board vessels in the subsea sector, particularly those just starting, will receive a common induction process before beginning work.