Shell and Ampelmann Operations have been fined a combined total of more than £1.2m after a worker’s feet were crushed while walking along a gangway over the North Sea.
Martin Hill, who was 63 at the time of the accident, was part of a group of maintenance workers being transferred on the Kroonborg support vessel towards Shell’s Galleon PG offshore gas rig on 17 October 2017.
The transfer went ahead in conditions of high wind and heavy seas, when it should not have done.
Hill made his way along the gangway from the support vessel towards the rig in the pre-sunrise gloom without enough artificial lighting.
His feet got trapped as the gangway telescoped together. Most of the bones in his feet were broken and his skin pulled off. The seriousness of the injuries meant he had to be airlifted to hospital and he narrowly avoided having both of his feet amputated.
‘Problems in place for a considerable time’
The HSE investigation found that people using the Ampelmann-designed and owned gangway were not sufficiently protected from the risks of entrapment and trip injury at the moving step.
Both Shell UK Ltd, of York Road, Lambeth, London, and Ampelmann Operations (UK), of Waterloo Quay, Aberdeen, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 3(1) of The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 at Chelmsford Crown Court on 14 December 2023.
Shell was fined £1,031,250 and Ampelmann £206,250, and the companies were ordered to pay £247,000 in costs each.
Mr Justice Johnson said in assessing Shell’s culpability: “The problems were in place for a considerable time and were far from minor or isolated.”
HSE inspector John Hawkins said: “The sentences passed reflect the importance of specialist companies making sure that all aspects of the equipment they design and deploy are, in fact safe, rather than just assumed to be safe.
“It is important operating companies continually challenge themselves, through effective audit and review of their procedures, to make sure their safety management systems are robust enough and that the safety instructions generated are clear, consistent and in accordance with guidance."
