MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Chilean rig at east access of Magellan Strait catches fire: all crew saved, no spill

The rig was operating at Sipetrol's AM-2 well, 14.9 kilometers southeast of Cape Virgenes, off Santa Cruz province

A Chilean-operated oil rig off Argentine Patagonia in the South Atlantic caught fire early on Wednesday, forcing all its eight workers to evacuate by rafts and oil production to shut down, reported the Argentine navy.

The workers were later picked up by the Golondrina del Mar (Sea Swallow), an Argentine tugboat that was in the vicinity, the navy added.

The predawn fire broke out inside the living quarters of the oil rig operated by Enap Sipetrol Argentina and located at the eastern access to the Magellan Strait.

”It was put out initially, but reignited later.... The (rig) safety chief said the oil wells are shut off,” the navy said in a statement. There were no reports of an oil spill in the Atlantic, 2800 kilometers south of Buenos Aires.

The exploration and drilling rig was identified as Sipetrol's AM-2, operating 14.9 kilometers southeast of Cape Virgenes, off Santa Cruz province.

Sipetrol Argentina is a subsidiary of Chile's ENAP (Empresa Nacional de Petroleo de Chile), which runs oil production facilities around the world, including Argentina, Ecuador, Colombia, Egypt, Iran and Yemen

Chile’s ENAP said the situation was quite exceptional since it’s the first time this kind of incident occurs, which fortunately had no major consequences. ENAP crews regularly stay for five days in the rigs until another shift moves in.

“The fire was under control and off by 08:30 in the morning and the rest of the platform was frozen to prevent any further advances. There’s an investigation to determine the origin of the fire”, said ENAP.

The company said there was no crude leaking into the Atlantic Ocean from the platform which produces around 408 barrels of oil per day and 290,000 cubic meters of natural gas. There’s no date yet to restart pumping operations.

Enap is a marginal producer of gas and oil with most activities focused on the refining of oil for the local market. The company is the main provider of fuel products in Chile.

The fire comes after two oil workers were missing but more than 30 others were rescued from a listing Sinopec rig off China’s northeast coast. Rescue teams saved 34 people who were working on the platform in the Shengli oil field off Dongying in Shandong province when the incident took place late Tuesday, the Chinese Transport ministry reported.

Helicopters and rescue boats were searching for the two people who slipped from the platform, now leaning at a 45-degree angle in shallow waters, the Xinhua news agency said.
The Shengli oil field, the second-largest in China, is operated by Sinopec, the biggest oil refiner in Asia.

“No oil was spilled,” a Sinopec spokesman said, confirming the rig’s valve had been immediately shut off and the 34 workers had been rescued.

“The cause of the accident is still under investigation” the spokesman said, adding it was probably due to powerful waves generated by Typhoon Malou, which made landfall in central Japan yesterday.

The platform accident comes less than two months after a July 16 oil spill sparked by the explosion of two pipelines operated by the country’s largest oil company, China National Petroleum Corp, in the north-eastern port of Dalian.

Official estimates said that 1,500 tons of crude poured into the Yellow Sea, but environmental watchdog Greenpeace said that the figure could be 60 times higher, making the spill one of the 30 worst in history.