Vivid memories of Piper Alpha

167 oil workers died in the platform disaster

Sixteen years ago the Piper Alpha North Sea platform disaster shocked and traumatised Scotland.

The devastating blaze in July 1988 killed 167 of the 226 men on board the Occidental oil drilling platform.

The BBC's On this Day site invited users to recall the tragedy which remains the world's worst-ever offshore oil disaster.

The responses conveyed a sense of the enormous loss suffered by friends and relatives which continues to affect many people to this day.

'Missing presumed dead'

Jodie Noble was seven years old when her father died on Piper Alpha.

"I didn't understand what my mum meant when she said my dad was missing and presumed dead," she said.

"For the next seven years I convinced myself that the body that was brought home to us was not my dad. My dad had amnesia and was living on an island somewhere where I would find him, eventually.

"When I turned 14 and my dad had been gone for half my life, I realised that he was not coming home. I cried and cried, because it took half my life before I realised that he was really dead."

"My brother never got over losing his dad, and after struggling with drug addiction, he hung himself in the year 2001."

My dad lived with the terrible burden that he survived whilst others perished. Helen Becker

Michelle Scorgie's father, Michael, died on Piper Alpha a month before her first birthday.

"I think the worst thing is, my dad was supposed to be coming home that day but he stayed on because my mum and dad were saving up to go on holiday as a family," she said.

Helen Becker, who now lives in France, said that her father survived the "horror" of Piper Alpha.

Andy Mochan died in April but Ms Becker said she takes solace from the 16 extra years she had with him.

"My dad lived with the terrible burden that he survived whilst others perished. His legacy to the oil industry is the campaigning he did at every available opportunity to improve safety on the rigs and in work places in general. "

Another who campaigned to improve safety was Kenny Kilday, who now lives in Canada.

Tooth and nail

He said that he was one of 500 offshore workers who resigned en masse two days after the disaster.

"I knew a lot of the guys that died - five from my home town of Greenock. I don't know what to do with my pain from this time. I still fight tooth and nail but to no avail. All that happens is I get the boot. I wish people could get it - no job is worth dying for," he said.

Victor Ward also e-mailed from Canada to say that he was working in the computer room at Occidental's head office in Aberdeen when the blast occurred.

"The whole night shift was taken up with making sure that we had all systems running to assist in the rescue effort," he said.

I'm sure it still affects many generations of those who perished and survived to this day. C Kinrade

"The pictures we saw in the morning were so devastating that I didn't sleep at all that day and into the next night."

C Kinrade, from the Isle of Man, said that his father survived the disaster but the consequences have still had a profound effect on his life.

David Kinrade, who survived by jumping into the North Sea, still has nightmares and has trouble sleeping at night, which leaves him in a state of shock when he wakes.

"I'm sure it still affects many generations of those who perished and survived to this day. Such a tragic loss that should never ever be repeated," he said.

Offshore worker Gary Hay was just seven when the disaster happened but he can remember the effect it had on his community.

He said: "Two boys I went to school with lost their fathers on the Piper Alpha, and the entire community I lived in reeled from the horror of what happened."

"I will continue to enjoy working offshore, as long as the safety of everyone on board is of paramount importance. It's a shame we had to lose so many, to have the standards we have today."