BP says not affected by Azerbaijan oil platform accident

Iran has extended its condolences to the government and nation of Azerbaijan over the deadly explosion and fire on an Azerbaijani oil platform in the Caspian Sea.

The discovery raised the confirmed death toll to seven while another 23 workers were still missing, feared dead after the fire which broke out on Friday.

The bodies of six oil workers missing from an Azeri oil platform in the Caspian Sea that caught fire on Friday have been found, the state energy company SOCAR said on Monday.

Khalig Memadov, SOCAR’s other Vice President said search operation will continue. Firefighters battled Saturday to restrain the fire, which is the most fatal episode in the history of the business, he said.

The company lost five workers in 2013 and 14 past year in similar accidents, said Mirvari Qahramanli, head of the Center for Protection of Oil Workers’ Rights, a Baku-based advocacy group.

As hopes of finding survivors faded, SOCAR said a severe storm was hampering rescue efforts at its platform in the Guneshli oil field.

The first body was found at the weekend.

President Ilham Aliyev has declared Sunday a day of mourning for those who died in the “incident on platform No. 10 in Gunashli oil field”, the agency reports.

SOCAR said on Sunday that one worker had been killed and 33 rescued, out of the 62 who were on the oil rig when the fire started. The Guneshli deposits were discovered in 1981 in the south Caspian Sea, some 90 km east of Baku. Platform number 10 is operated exclusively by SOCAR.

In 2011, a drilling platform sank in a storm off Russia’s far eastern coast, killing 53 people.

Oil production on 28 oil wells linked to the facility was suspended and all oil and gas pipelines, which link the platform with the land, were blocked as a safety precaution, SOCAR added in the joint statement with the emergency ministry and the country’s chief prosecutor.