Growing up in Aberdeen, Scotland, the shadow of the Piper Alpha disaster loomed large over our community. The tragic explosion of the oil rig platform in 1988 claimed the lives of 167 people. Back then, I was blissfully unaware of the ecological ramifications of that disaster. But the spill of 670 tonnes of oil wreaked havoc on marine life and had a lasting impact on the marine environment that I love to explore.
In recent decades, there has been a gradual decline in the number of oil spills and the volume of oil discharged from tankers, rigs, wells and offshore platforms. While incidents continue to occur globally – often in less scrutinised regions than the North Sea – the UK has, thankfully, not experienced another disaster of Piper Alpha’s magnitude since.
