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Subscribe to RSSSearchers in the Gulf of Mexico say they've found the body of one of the two people who went missing after an oil platform explosion on Friday. NBC's Lester Holt reports.
The owner of an oil platform that caught fire after an explosion in the Gulf of Mexico last week said Sunday that it has expanded its search for a missing worker, and doctors said one of four men burned in the blaze is improving and is now in fair condition.
Two remained in critical condition and one in serious condition, doctors said.
Three dive boats are now working around the burned platform and Plaquemines Parish sheriff's deputies are checking beaches, Black Elk Energy of Houston said in a statement emailed Sunday evening.
It said all helicopter companies flying in the area have been asked to keep an eye out, and a search-and-rescue dog will be brought to the platform Monday.
The body of a second missing worker was found Saturday and turned over to the Jefferson Parish coroner, added the company, which said it is cooperating with investigators.
"We remain focused on the victims and their families, including those injured," the statement said.
'I am alive'
At Baton Rouge General Medical Center's burn unit, Wilberto Ilagan, 50, of the Philippines, told Dr. Jeffrey Littleton that he wanted to send a message, according to a news release issued Sunday.
"To my relatives, to my family, and to my country, I am alive and in good health," Ilagan said. "I am burned, but my heart and lungs are healthy."
According to The Advocate, Littleton said Sunday that the other men's names are being withheld because they have not given their consent to release them.
The Philippine Embassy in Washington has said all the workers are from the Philippines.
Body found at scene of oil platform explosion in Gulf of Mexico, Coast Guard says
The Coast Guard has suspended its own search after checking 1,400 square miles near the oil platform, located about 20 miles southeast of Grand Isle, La.
John Hoffman, the president and CEO of Black Elk Energy, said in an earlier statement that the body was found near where the explosion occurred. The dead, missing and wounded workers were employees of oilfield contractor Grand Isle Shipyard, he said.
Gerald Herbert / AP
An explosion and fire on Friday severely damaged an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, about 25 miles southeast of Grand Isle, La.
Cause of fire unknown
GIS CEO Mark Pregeant released a statement that the company has notified the families of those involved but was not releasing their names, WWL-TV in New Orleans reported.
Authorities have said the blaze erupted Friday morning while workers were using a torch to cut an oil line on the platform.
Pregeant's statement, however, said the cause of the fire and explosion is unknown and that "initial reports that a welding torch was being used at the time of the incident or that an incorrect line was cut are completely inaccurate."
Eleven people were injured in the production platform blast and oil spillage was minimal, according to the Coast Guard. NBC's Brian Williams reports.
A man who answered the phone at the company's Galliano, La., office on Sunday said the company had no comment.
Coast Guard searches for 2 missing after Gulf oil rig blast
Lawsuit
Separate from the explosion, Grand Isle Shipyard is facing a lawsuit by a group of former workers from the Philippines who claim they were confined to cramped living quarters and forced to work long hours for substandard pay. The lawsuit was filed in late 2011 in a Louisiana federal court and is pending. Lawyers for the company have said the workers' claims are false and should be dismissed.
The workers recently obtained conditional class certification for allegations that Grand Isle Shipyard didn't pay them properly for overtime and may have violated other fair-labor standards, said attorney Joseph C. Peiffer. He said a notice will go out soon to let other workers know they might be able to join the lawsuit.
He said he was not representing the injured workers, but didn't rule out the possibility that he might do so.
Meanwhile, Black Elk said no oil was leaking from the charred platform, which hadn't been operating since August.
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Leave a Comment:
Filipinos ..... doing the jobs Mexicans won't do.
Doesn't matter where they are from. They are going to have a long road ahead of them due to the extent of the burns. I am glad that this didn't turn into another oil disaster.
This is really sad .....Somebody working their tail off and being hurt or losing their life doing it. Prayers to these people and their families.
The history of Black Elk's treatment of employees sure looks bad, and their safety record is less than stellar. And with a CEO imported from BP, seems to me that it's another case of "how cheap can we get the job done without actually getting caught in wrong-doing".
Grand Isle Shipyard not Black Elk, learn to read.
Black Elk is a top rate oilfield company, they own the platform where this happened, at best only one or two of the employees on the platform were Black Elk employees, most likely a company man and an engineer.
The crew doing the work was a third party contractor called Grand Isle Shipyard who is also the company with employment law suit, it is a very common practice to hire crews from other countries to work at companies like this.
Most people come to this article desperately wanting to know if oil is leaking into the gulf, so the authors insert the following short sentence waaaayyyy down at the very bottom of the page: "Meanwhile, Black Elk said no oil was leaking from the charred platform, which hadn't been operating since August." Two problems exist here: 1) The obvious manipulation of readers and 2) Black Elk runs the rig, so how do we know that oil really isn't leaking? What a terrible "news" article, one that is wholly focused on a few unfortunate individuals' injuries rather than on the primary concern. It reads like a local news piece on a fire somewhere.
I noticed that any mention of safety violations was missing, also where is the story on the "imported" Phillipino slave laborers? I just hope those contract workers have health insurance that will cover their injuries even after they are fired by their employer.
are there not any Amercans here that need work ?
Americans expect to be paid for their work. Bunch o' commies.
johna58 ....you maybe? go apply. I'm sure they need replacements for the dead workers.
Heck why work when you have Barrack-a-claus ! And his free handouts just ask the 50% heck instead of where's waldo we have where's obuma !
wytraveler... Free handouts like the Obama phone? Oops, that has been COMPLETELY debunked. What free handouts come from Obama? Yet another fool spouting nonsense and hatred for OUR democratically chosen president.
Interesting how the oil and gas (oil services companies too) industries are insourcing workers from overseas while spewing jobs rhetoric. "Keystone XL , oil platform drilling, oil shale excavation, etc. will create jobs" BLAH BLAH BLAH. Jobs for whom? Certainly not American as far as Grand Isle Shipyard is concerned.
I sincerely hope that they find the missing worker... speedy recovery for all those affected by this tragedy.
Oops, wrong completely not debunked.
ObamaPhone
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpAOwJvTOio
You're seriously using a Romney supporter to debunk this myth? Epic fail, Robbob. You lose this argument, and as a penalty, the next three arguments.
You are going to try and claim she is a Romney supporter, you are flat out side your mind to think that.
Sticking your head in the sand and going la la la doesn't change the fact that she is a Obama supporter, just like all the other goofballs who were waiting for Obama to pay their gas and mortgage bills.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P36x8rTb3jI
Just like a lib to flat out deny the truth when it's right in your face, you can TRY and Deny just like your feckless leader but the truth is the truth.
PS I never loss because I never have to Lie & Deny. Oblamo lied people died.
Robbob... Wow it must be scary being you. You believe everything you see on TV and hear on the radio don't you? Admit it because this "Obama phone" thing is yet ANOTHER nontroversy by the Grand Ole Plutocrt party in order to get someone in the presidency who would give the wealthy the GIFT of 20% tax breaks, the financial sector the GIFT 0% tax rate on capital gains, the extraction industries (oil, nat gas, coal, etc.) the GIFT of no regulations, etc.
PS: Elvis is ALIVE check out this video it provides ALL the proof YOU would ever need.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXKafsX4foA
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/10/the-obama-phone/
Let me guess... you will say that ALL fact checkers (factcheck.org,m snopes, NBC, CBS, ABC, etc.) are biased and that the only "TRUE" facts come from Fauz, Drudge, Hannity, Limpballs, etc.
Wake up man... our country needs people like you to LEARN to critically think and read in order to become productive citizens. No more Faux-bot/Rom-bot/Norquist-bot mentality please.
First do you actually believe that both videos I posted are not real and are not real Oblamo supports. You are out side your mind if you believe that load of BS.
Second I do not and have not ever watch the shows you accuse me of getting my facts from, the truth be told I haven't watched reg TV in 10 years.
I know the whole story behind the Oblamo phone, I never said it wasn't started a long time ago, but you also know for damn sure that the two women in the videos that I linked believe 100% what they are saying.
Not not scary at all being me, in fact its great, I least I not some libtard being spoon fed lies everyday by the lame stream news who distort the truth like your beloved NBC ABC CBS has been caught doing not to long ago. Oblamo lied people died.
As for as waking up and Learning I can guarantee you I have forgotten more than any libtard will ever know. All any libtard has is lies, delusions, insults and rants, hit them with true facts and they all fold like a house of cards in a hurricane.
Blah blah blah... robbob you are a typical RWNJ who has nothing better to do then to (attempt to) insult "libtards". A foolish fool is what you are. Like Mr. T. "I pity the fool".
An all Phillipino crew working for Grand Isle Shipyards on an offshore project in South Louisiana, now what could go wrong? About like all American companies nowdays, if you can't export the job, import the worker and save a few bucks. Makes you wonder how Black Elk was voted one of the best companies to work for in Houston, I didn't realize it had that big a Phillipino population. Sorry for the pain and suffering of the workers and their families, irregardless of country of origin.
Easy they are not the ones who hired the all Filipino crew, that was Grand Isle Shipyards a completely different company from Black Elk.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/nov/18/body-found-black-elk-explosion
There is not much to be learned from any article in regard to this story, but there is this. I am not quite sure what a "sheen" means but further along in this article come:
another wag the dog tale! there goes the cost of gasoline again.
You know oil platforms are extremely expensive to erect & operate, & hazardous too. You know the Canadians are squeezing oil out of sand. You know we're getting ready to extract oil from rocks, You know it's our most valuable source of lubricants & plastics. You know about 40,000 people will die on the nation's highways this year, with over 2,500,000 injured, & that's just your fellow Americans. Yet you believe we have the right to burn up 90% of the extracted petroleum on those same highways.
Don't take my word for it, read the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, & while you're at it, the Bible, Koran, Talmud, sayings of Confuscious (Kung Fu Tse), the Budha, & the Rig Vedas. You have no civil, political, or God given right to drive.
Do you know how to tell when you've been brainwashed? When you believe something you know isn't so.
Not a post I would expect from "Musician666".
Isn't it funny how things like this always happen right after something is settled, planed or passed by the government or companies in coal and oil? The "NATURE NAZIS" are at work again. This is the new SPICKS IN THE TREE from the tree huggers applied to the oil industry, but now with the support of another 4 years of the LIBERALS. Don't think, for one second, that this administration will allow any type of added or new oil production because the "SAVE THE EARTH" vote is too important to them. Anyway if they did, it would mean a self reliant and economically prosperous America without a large government welfare state to hang over voters heads and of course they can't have that, can they.
More American companies hiring non-Americans...how patriotic? Despite this dispicable behavior by,"Big Oil", my heart and prayers go out to the people and their families who were hurt, missing or were killed.
On another note. We seem to have a war of words going on here between so called conservatives and liberals. As an innocent, independent, person that hates these labels...Democrats & republicans, liberals & conservatives or blue states and red states. I'd like to remind ya'll that we're all Americans so we all have at least one thing in common. Why don't ya'll stop with the name calling and come together as one collective voice to help this country solve some of our many problems. We would all be better served if we would just remember we are all really on the same side. I don't see left vs right nearly as much as I see educated vs uneducated. Get to the facts first then have an educated opinion. The truth is out there, it's up to you to find it. And I don't mean an alternate universe with separate facts. The facts and the truth are one in the same. The truth will prevail because the truth is out there! Now go find it!