While the delay in the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill is said to be affecting the flow of investment into the oil and gas industry, pirate attacks on oil vessels on the Nigerian waters continue to present challenges for investors in the industry.Following frequent attacks on drilling rigs by pirates, some major international oil companies operating in the country have suspended their activities, while some have moved deeper offshore, where the risks are very minimal.Nigeria topped the list of countries in the Gulf of Guinea where piracy and sea robbery held sway in 2013, according to the International Maritime Bureau.
The IMB noted that Nigerian pirates moved further afield last year and ventured far into waters off Gabon, Ivory Coast and Togo, where they were linked with at least five of the region’s seven reported vessel hijackings.
This week, CourtHouse News Service reported that an oil and gas supply boat captain, Wren Thomas, who was kidnapped and tortured by Nigerian pirates last year, had sued Chevron USA and Edison Chouest Offshore for failing to take safety measures that could have prevented the attack.
Thomas, who sued the companies on October 16, 2014, in Harris County Court, Texas, claimed that Chevron ignored threats from the Nigerian pirates who hijacked its supply boat, took the captain hostage and tortured him for 18 days in a filthy and mosquito-infested camp.
He also claimed that in July 2011, Edison Chouest made him the captain of its 200-foot vessel, the C-Retriever, tasked with supporting Chevron drilling off Nigeria’s coast.
Chevron and Edison Chouest were well aware that pirates patrolled the area, because pirates had stormed ECO’s vessel Fast Servant in 2010, beat two U.S. captains and stole the boat’s equipment, Thomas said.
“Again, in November 2011, three men employed by ECO aboard the C-Endeavor supporting Chevron operations were attacked and taken hostage,” he said.
Thomas said the danger became tangible in the spring of 2013 when he began getting death threats over the boat’s radio system and cell phone.
He reported the threats to his Chevron and ECO bosses, who assured him the problem had been handled and told him “the vessel would lose thousands of dollars in down time and possibly its contract with Chevron” if he left the ship, Thomas said.
“On October 17, 2013, ECO received a detailed threat from a militant group in the state of Bayelsa, Nigeria,” the complaint states. “The group threatened to kidnap ECO vessel crews and burn their vessels if certain demands were not met.”
But the companies were unfazed, Thomas says, because five days later they ordered him to make a supply run “into one of the most pirate-infested areas in West Africa.” En route to the delivery point, the C-Retriever was attacked by Nigerian pirates in the Gulf of Guinea, at 3 a.m. on October 23, 2013, Thomas said.
In his lawsuit, he said the ordeal left him with post-traumatic stress disorder, insomnia, high blood pressure, an infection, and financial and marital problems, seeking punitive damages for gross negligence under the Jones Act, a federal law that regulates working conditions for U.S. seamen.
Piracy will increase in the Gulf of Guinea as Nigeria prepares for an election next February in order to funnel ransom money into campaign financing, intelligence experts were reported to have told a shipping conference in Copenhagen on October 7.
Risk Intelligence, which advises private shipping companies and governments on security, said two “mother ships” belonging to pirates are currently located just south of Nigeria and five seafarers are known to be held hostage onshore.
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