Reportage
North Sea: No access without a safety course

The blue pointed flag with the seven-pointed white star weighs merrily in the mild autumn wind. No, we are not at the Esplanade in Copenhagen, we are at Maersk Training in Esbjerg. There is lively activity already well before eight o'clock.

- Good morning, which course are you going on, the receptionists say over and over again to the stream of thoughtful men who come through the door.

Offshore safety training takes place here on a large scale both for the maritime industry, oil and gas and the wind turbine industry. Maersk Training's Ib Auener accepts and the instructor is in the best mood.

We have been allowed to be part of the 48-year-old electrician Jan Hansen's path to work on the rebuilding of Tyra II. Part of the preparations for Jan Hansen's new job at Semco Maritime is a comprehensive safety course. The theory had already been put into place the day before in the four-day safety course known as BOSIET, which stands for Basic Offshore Safety Induction & Emergency Training. The course is a requirement to be allowed to work on the North Sea.

Now it is time for practical exercises, where sea rescue is the first item on the program this day. The course also includes helicopter training on emergency landing in water, fire fighting and a gas course.

In the classroom, the last of the eleven-man team needs to arrive before Ib Auener can give the final instructions for the day's exercises. Jan Hansen sits in the first row, and there is time for a little ping pong of fun between him and the director. Somewhere in the background, the music sounds: it's just a little crush every time we touch. But there are no small crushes, just a pleasant morning.

Last man arrives and Ib Auener gives the last instructions, we leave the teaching building in the direction of the training facilities with pool.

Jan Hansen grabs a banana from one of the sumptuous fruit bowls available to the students.

- He is a fun maker, says Jan Hansen about the director.

Safety first at Maersk Training

Outside the building, the students suddenly take a strange turn as they follow Ib Auener.

- This is something they do here, Jan Hansen says, because the course participants follow a marking in the asphalt for pedestrians very precisely.

We almost walk in twos and twos with Ib Auener at the front as a troop leader, and I get a flashback to the Lifeguard, except that there is a really good atmosphere here. Perhaps also because the director is a man of real stature.

The rearguard is formed by the electrician Jørgen Peter Dich, and although you can't see it, he is both a mature and experienced gentleman.

- I am 65 years old, and I actually helped build the first Tyra field, says Jørgen Peter Dich.

The convoy stops before we enter the training pool building, there are a number of safety instructions that need to be explained.

- I think it has become too much with all that security. It has become a whole business. The biggest safety improvement I've seen was when we started keeping one hand on the banister on the stairs. You should know how many people have gone astray when they had to get two cups of coffee. The partner must also have a cup of coffee, says Jørgen Peter Dich warmly, as he raises his eyebrows.

He has no work yet in the North Sea, and there are also certain requirements if it is to be.

- So I don't want to pull cables anymore, the young people have to do that. I could imagine a supervisor job. I've had that before, he says.

There is also one reason after another why the cables on the North Sea might not pull as much.

- I have a young wife. She is 52 years old, so . . , says Jørgen Peter Dich now with an even bigger smile.

Jørgen Peter Dich quickly gives his mobile number, because he wants to tell more.

The safety stocking and synchronized swimming

Arriving at the training hall with the pool, it is time to change. As the changing room is small and you get close to each other, the autumn season requires a mask as the number of corona increases sharply.

But the other safety instructions have been received completely without a single comment, then there is a quiet "ouch" from someone in the group as the instructor comes with a box of masks.

- It is for everyone's safety, says Ib Auener.

While the trainees start their first change into a thermo-fleece jumpsuit, I follow Ib Auener in, where team leader Sonnich Nielsen and Leif Olesen are waiting. They are both safety divers and ready for the sea rescue exercises.

While Ib Auener hastily changes into his swimming suit, he explains the learning philosophy.

- It must be a good experience, and you learn better when you have fun, Ib Auener tells me.

Yes, there is something completely different from the learning I once experienced at Livgarden, if I may say so.

- Well, have you been there too, comes the laughing from Ib Auener.

He has been a commanding officer in the Armed Forces, first in the Lifeguard, before he was a firefighter for twenty years.

Inside the hall, the whole team is ready to put on the helicopter survival suits. These are the suits everyone has to wear when they have to be flown by helicopter out to the North Sea. It is not easy to get the suits on. It requires a thorough explanation from the instructors, because it is a change of clothes that becomes everyday when the trainees have to be flown to work in the North Sea.

You have to learn how to put on such a suit, and it actually requires powder to get your hands through the rubber cuffs in the sleeves of the suits.

Sonnich Nielsen just powders Jan Hansen's cuffs with great concentration, so that the hands can slip through. Finally, everyone is in their suits and ready to go through a so-called safety sock.

A safety sock is designed to be able to evacuate 140 people from a drilling platform at a height of 40 to 50 meters into a rescue raft at sea level. It could be if the platform catches fire and needs to be evacuated. Everyone must learn how to fit the grips in the worst possible situation.

But also how to manage without a life raft must be learned. Everyone gets in the water and learns to swim with an injured colleague and swim in a hose, so that a team both stays together, but can also be seen better from the air. It helps in a rescue situation, should the accident happen.

Ib Auener, Sonnich Nielsen and Leif Olesen are all in the water with the course participants. There is no way the three can stand on the bottom of the barely four-metre-deep pool, but it looks that way.

Swimming safety lessons are actually a performance.

See the photo gallery from the sea rescue training at Maersk Training in Esbjerg above.