The Seacrest Drill Ship a.k.a 'The Scan Queen'

(Southern Gulf of Thailand)

Depth 70meters ; Trimix diving only

Tonnage : 4,400 gross tonnage, Length : 110 m Breadth : 20 m Draught :6m

Details of Sinking:-

Sunk by 'Typhoon Gay' 1989.

91 rig workers of many nationalities were killed in the disaster, leading to a massive legal case brought against the ships owners UNOCAL by over 90 bereaved relatives from around the world. After the vessel capsized and the storm blew through, the rescue authorities had problems located it, leading to the only 2 survivors of the calamity spending an unusually long amount of time in the water prior to recovery. The sinking represented the third worst oil rig disaster anywhere, though there is little or no mention of the loss on the www oil rig disaster sites.

Investigation revealed the reason the rig went over was that the drill ship had the Derrick full of 200 ton of pipe, and was still connected to the well head at the time the storm hit leading to a high C of G and compromised stability. Standard practice with this type of vessel is to lay down pipe when bad weather threatens - UNOCAL said no, to save time. = 91 dead.

The legal proceedings that followed the sinking are mentioned by UNOCAL's legal representatives at http://www.susmangodfrey.com/clientssay.html and at http://www.susmangodfrey.com/practice/practice_foreign.html "In Sandoval v. UNOCAL, our client UNOCAL owned the drill ship Seacrest which capsized during Typhoon Gay in the Gulf of Thailand in 1989. Plaintiffs representing over 90 decedents sued UNOCAL in Texas and throughout the world. Our lawyers were required to completely learn the Thai civil code in order to defend the case."

The unique character of 'Typhoon Gay' which sunk hundreds of fishing vessels with its 100knt+ winds and 40ft waves is discussed at https://www.cnmoc.navy.mil/nmosw/thh_nc/thailand/sattahip/text/sect7.htm . "Typhoon Gay hit Southern Thailand Chumphon province in 1989, the only typhoon-strength storm ever to reach Thailand in recorded history. Gay killed 529 people and left 160,000 homeless".

note:-  Access to the Typhoon gay data is via a secure US military web site. You will need to accept a security certificate to read the extract and your IP will be logged....

The worlds worst oil rig disaster was the catastrophic fire on the Occidental Oil platform 'Piper-Alpha' located in the North Sea late in the evening of 6 July 1988, causing a devastating blaze which killed 167 of the 226 men on board. Other mobile oil rig disasters include Alexander L. Kielland(123 dead-1980), Ocean Ranger(84 dead-1984) US-OIL drill ship(81 dead-1981).

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Listings of Major Oilrig disaster are available at the following links:-

http://oilrigwork.netfirms.com/Accidents.htm

http://www.oilrigdisasters.co.uk

 

Wrecks details

LATEST REPORT 2008

Lies upside down resting on the derrick.starbaord side 1m from the sand, port side 4m.

Depth is 75m to sand, 50m to the top of the hull where you can enter through the moon

pool at 50m. Great viz and full of fish.

This picture at the top of the page is of another ship from the same yard. The actual Seacrest has Wheel house aft - similar size

Last dived by:-

Fred Evans(deceased) UNOCAL
Jamie Macleod, Stewart Oehl and the divers and crew of the M.V. Trident March 2007
MV Trident may be contacted at www.techthailand.com 

Last updates:-

May 2008,Jamie Macleod Jamie MacLeod on the MV Trident  jamie@techthailand.com

15 May 2007, Simon Marquis simon@oilrigdisasters.co.uk ,  http://www.oilrigdisasters.co.uk

 

Anonymous Contributors - A note of thanks

I am indebted to the many friends and relatives of those who perished in this sinking who have contacted me with information to contribute to this shipwreck disaster research page.

Many still work in the oil industry and all have asked to remain anonymous.

Many have quoted fear from the enormous negative publicity and multi-million dollar legal action kicked up by this disaster that still exists to this day, or the fear of loosing their jobs if they say anything that may considered in breach of commercial confidence.

 If you have any information or corrections to the data on this page that you would like to contribute anonymously, or if you would like your contact details forwarded to other personnel effected by this tragedy, please contact me, and I will forward your contact details to them for consideration in confidence.