Oil platform on fire in Gulf of Mexico

USA

NEW ORLEANS, January 5, 2017 – No injuries were immediately reported in an oil rig fire that began at 2.30 am local time Thursday off the coast of Louisiana.

Four workers were rescued by a passing supply ship, the Mary Wyatt Milano, after jumping into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico to escape the fire, which the US Coast Guard and nearby vessels struggled to control.

“There are no current reports of any pollution at the moment,” Travis Magee, a Coast Guard officer, told the Associated Press, adding that the fire had been “suppressed but not extinguished.”

It was not immediately clear who was the operator of the stricken platform, located some 129 km south of Grand Isle, nor what the cause of the fire was.

A 2010 explosion on the BP-operated Deepwater Horizon rig, which subsequently sunk, resulted in the deaths of 11 workers and the spilling of millions of barrels of oil into the gulf.

Photo courtesy of: www.shipspotting.com

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