A colleague sent a link to a Marathon Oil Company Macondo presentation that was posted by the Houston Chronicle. The presentation was intended for internal training and discussion purposes.
Firstly, I applaud Marathon for ensuring that the blowout is studied and debated within the company. Hopefully, they did the same thing for Montara, have a good internal system for studying accidents throughout the industry, and thoroughly investigate all of Marathon’s incidents and near misses.
I thought Marathon’s comments about safety culture were particularly interesting, including these on slide 58:
Although harder to define and measure, and even more difficult to regulate, we pointed to our culture as the single most important differentiating attribute when comparing us to BP.
In a recent meeting with an individual who has numerous dealings with BP, he observed that regardless of the purpose of the gathering (planning session to morning rig call), it is almost impossible to determine who is ultimately responsible and accountable for the operation being discussed. Evidence of this exists in the very report this presentation was derived from.
I wonder what convinces Marathon that their safety culture is superior. The above anecdote, while interesting, doesn’t tell us much. Prior to Macondo (and perhaps even after the blowout), I’ll bet most BP employees thought that they had a strong safety culture. Ditto for Transocean. Does Marathon have any better evidence demonstrating the strength of their safety culture? If not, what makes them so confident? Does Marathon have a process for assessing and monitoring the attitude and commitment of their employees? Have they conducted regular internal surveys to gauge safety culture? My sense is that they have not. If they had, they could make their case without the very subjective comparison with BP.
Bud's Offshore Energy (BOE) 
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