Caspian Sea oil rig fire - Azeri disaster

Caspian-Sea-oil-rig-disaster-December-2015

Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev has declared a day of national mourning as state-owned oil company SOCAR declares that 29 workers are missing and presumed dead, after its oil platform in the Caspian Sea caught fire on Friday.

On Sunday, SOCAR revealed one worker had died and 33 rescued, out of its 62 member of staff present on the oil rig. 29 people remain unnacounted for.

Khoshbakht Usifzade, SOCAR vice-president, said in news conference: "we continue the search-and-rescue operation ... We regard those whom we have not found so far as missing."

Mr Usifzade added they were also looking for three workers who had been swept into the sea in a separate incident on another oil platform on Friday.

Khalig Mamedov, another vice president of the oil company said: "Despite all the efforts, regrettably, no one has been found... this is the biggest tragedy in SOCAR's history."

Source

Regarded as the worst offshore disaster since Piper Alpha