Employees fired for negligence, resulting in spill

Petrotrin has fired six employees that were found to have contributed to the series of events that caused an oil spills in the Gulf of Paria. A total of 12 workers were suspended at the end of January in order for investigations into the spill to be completed. The six employees that were not fired have been fully reinstated.

Khalid Hassanali announced on Saturday (February 8th) that letters of termination had been sent to the six employees after the investigation into the spill found that they had "high degrees of culpability" when it came to the leak. The investigation by the state-owned oil company found that December 17th's oil spill was a result of negligence and carelessness by employees and not sabotage.

Around 7,000 barrels of fuel oil spilled into the Gulf of Paria at the end of 2013. The spill occurred near the Pointe-a-Pierre port, Trinidad and Tobago, affecting local communities and businesses. The investigation into the incident was completed on Friday (February 7th) but it was not decided what the result of the findings would be until the following morning.

Among those that were fired as a result of the spill were a port operations co-ordinator, a shift supervisor, a foreman, a dock supervisor and two shift team leaders. Although the other six workers that were suspended have been reinstated, Mr Hassanali announced at a press conference that another investigation, this time into the asset's integrity, has now started.

The leak started at Tank 68 in Pointe-a-Pierre, which began pumping operations as normal on December 17th 2013. However, workers reported that they were not receiving any oil even though the tank was pumping. They then started to check the line in an attempt to find the problem and ultimately stopped pumping. Local fishermen then reported early in the morning that oil was present in the water off the coast.

According to Mr Hassanali, there were a number of failings that led to the leak; including failing to shut the pumping down after 30 minutes of no oil being received. Workers also did not isolate the line on the viaduct.