Crisis Communicartion Analysis

Kiana Riego

Individual Crisis Response 2

Oil Platform Explosion in Brazil

Mount Saint Vincent University

PBRL 4019-01

Situation

Petrobas is an integrated oil and gas company, founded in 1953 in Brazil by the federal government. Their headquarters is in Rio de Janerio, Brazil. They produce more than two million barrels of oil per day. Petrobas has operations in all aspects of the oil and gas production chain and other alternative energy sources, such as biofuels. Petrobas has 134 production platforms offshore, 15 refineries, 326 vessel fleets, 5 biodiesel plants, 21 thermoelectric plants, 4 wind plants and 7,710 service stations. Petrobas has energy assets in 18 countries, including Africa, North America, South America, Europe, and Asia. The total of all their assets is $137.3 billion, measured in 2012 (Petrobas, 2015).

On February 11th, 2015, 12:50 p.m. local time there was an explosion on a natural gas flotation production storage and offloading (FPSO) unit off the state of Espirito Santo, in South-Eastern Brazil. The platform is operated by Norway’s BW Offshore Ltd. There were 74 workers on board, and six remain missing. At least three workers were killed, and 10 injured. The FPSO operates on the Camarupim and Camarupim Norte fields in Espirito Santo littoral approximately 120 km from the coast (Petrobas, 2015).

Crisis Timeline

* Petrobas releases a statement the day of the incident. The cause of the explosion is still under investigation. The statement contains the following:

* “The accident was controlled by the immediate deployment of the Contingency Plan, mobilizing all the necessary recourses. FPSO operations have been shut down” (Petrobas, 2015).

* “BW Offshore is providing all the necessary assistance to its employees and family members with Petrobras support” (Petrobas, 2015).

* Petrobas notifies the Brazilian Navy and Brazil’s national petroleum, natural gas and biofuels agency, ANP (Petrobas, 2015).

* Petrobas...