The world's first public wireless broadband service for offshore and remote oil and gas drilling rigs and production platforms has been launched by BT and Schlumberger. The new service enables offshore workers to communicate more easily with friends and family back home using e-mail, instant messaging and webcam.
Installed by the Schlumberger Information Solutions (SIS), the service has been operational on the Byford Dolphin rig in the North Sea during a three month trial with connectivity provided over the rig's main satellite link. The rig's workers - numbering more than a hundred - can use laptops and PDAs, throughout the rig accommodation area, to access the internet as they would from any BT Openzone hotspot onshore.
Because of the success of the trial, Schlumberger will now roll-out the public wireless service globally for remote and offshore drilling and production operations.
Demetrios Stellas, vice president for Digital Infrastructure, SIS, said: "Our industry is continually looking for new ways to improve the welfare and wellbeing of offshore and remote workers. Increasingly, offshore workers expect to have access to the internet services that they can get at home. We believe that this new service will be recognised as a real benefit by oil workers who often work in harsh and difficult environments both offshore and in frontier locations."
