Oil and gas workers, particularly well service contractors working offshore, are exposed to greater risk of severe upper extremity injuries that can result in hospitalisation or amputation.
While serious hand injuries among oil and gas workers can potentially be life changing, the injuries are often easily preventable or at the very least mitigated through appropriate protection and hazard controls.
Along with cuts and lacerations, crush injuries are the most common type of injury and occur when body parts get caught in, on or between objects, which are referred to as ‘pinch points’.
This type of crush injuries can be particularly severe if they involve heavy objects or if the worker is unable to promptly free their hand.
In a finger crush injury reported by Resources Safety & Health Queensland, three key issues were identified.
These were: the worker had not identified the equipment being used at a new site was different to that of his usual work location, the work conducted was a routine task by an experienced worker and no risks had been identified, and the site induction conducted prior to the worker commencing at the new site failed to identify the difference in the work environment.
Recommendations included using mechanical aids and adding engineering controls for heavy lifting; importantly, it was recommended that repetitive and routine tasks were the subject of comprehensive risk assessments to identify and control hazards.
Another type of hand injury commonly reported is an impact injury, which can cause fractures, dislocations, and deep tissue damage – impact injuries can also be caused by repetitive tasks such as hammering, a known source of carpal tunnel syndrome.
Injuries specific to the oil and gas sector include chemical corrosion and burns (from sulphuric acid, nitric acid, toluene, etc.), exposure to hazardous or radioactive substances, high temperature burns from hot steam or high-temperature liquids, and biological hazards such as harmful microorganisms.
According to the International Association of Drilling Contractors, hand and finger injuries accounted for about 43 per cent of all recorded incidents on drilling rigs.
The primary root causes of these incidents are inattention or lack of focus, inadequate assessment of risk, cutting corners and rushing (mistaken priorities around safety versus objectives), lifting or applying force incorrectly, and using the incorrect tool for the job.
An expert in occupational safety explained that hand injuries were among the more difficult safety problems to mitigate, but the right “different” approaches have been shown to lead to better results on many levels.
He said seeing hand injury problems from a broader perspective can lead to identifying and designing out previously hidden risks and also toward applying more effective human factors prevention methods.
Personal protective equipment (PPE) designed for hands, such as gloves, is the most common form of hand and finger protection across the oil and gas industry.
These can have different purposes and applications, such as the use of impact-resistant gloves for certain positions, or even the simple use of brightly-coloured gloves (with the colour changed regularly) to increase employee awareness of hand safety while working.
Specific types of gloves also provide mechanical protection, heat and flame protection, anti-vibration, and chemical resistance.
An industrial safety product expert said PPE and gloves were the last line of defence for one of our most valuable tools – our hands.
“Despite this, hand safety is frequently overlooked when we’re in a rush, which is why Australia has such high rates of hand injuries, especially among industrial employees.
“The most important thing is making sure that gloves are fit for purpose – matching the right equipment to the right application means that you are getting the best possible protection.
“If you are wearing gloves that are too bulky when working with small parts, chances are you’ll just end up taking them off out of frustration.”
The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) examined data from 32 jurisdictions in the United States to determine trends around severe injuries in the oil and gas sector between January 2015 and July 2022.
A total of 2,101 severe oil and gas extraction-related injuries were reported during the period, with well service contract workers’ injuries accounting for the highest number of amputations (417) and hospitalisations (1,194), which represented 20 per cent and 57 per cent of the total, respectively.
Moreover, 895 (43 per cent) of all severe injuries reported involved upper extremities, 771 (86.1 per cent) of which involved the hands.
Machinery was found to be the leading source of injury among oil and gas contractors and operators (21.9 per cent), followed by structures and surfaces (8.3 per cent).
The authors wrote: “Although oil and gas extraction (OGE) workers represent a small proportion of the US workforce, these workers are consistently overrepresented in reports of work related injuries, illnesses and fatalities.
“Among OGE workers, contract workers in oil and gas subindustry support activities and personnel in the well-servicing sub-industry experience a greater number of severe work-related injuries than those in the drilling contractor and operator subindustries.
“This finding might be attributed to the temporary nature of most work in this sub-industry, which is largely without a social safety net, and consists of high-hazard jobs for which workers do not receive consistent training.”
The research highlighted that most severe injuries affected the upper and lower extremities, involved machinery or parts and materials, and were caused by contact with objects or trips, slips, and falls.
A survey conducted last year by the International Association of Oil & Gas Producers’ (IOGP) Safety Committee aimed to determine if its members were seeing increasing or decreasing safety trends in 2022 compared to previous years.
A number of metrics were used, such as the fatal accident rate (FAR), total recordable incident rate (TRIR), lost time incident rate (LTIR), and process safety events (PSE).
It was identified that fatal accidents and LTIR had increased among most respondents and incident severity had increased, while TRIR and high potential incident frequency were relatively static and tier 1 and 2 PSEs decreased.
The IOGP recommended an enhanced and deliberate focus on activities with potential to cause permanent impairment injuries or fatalities, creating safety awareness at the point of risk, building the safety capacity of the workforce, and contractor engagement.
It said: “[Operators should be] focusing on the highest-risk, safety-critical activities, and reduce front line exposure to more general, non-safety critical business activities.”