Emergency Exercise Performed at Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm (UK)

Emergency services from North Wales and the North West took part in a major simulated exercise at Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm yesterday.

Exercise ARGO is using dummies instead of real people to test rescue procedures and recovery times for the 160 turbine site, which is more than eight miles offshore in Liverpool Bay.

RAF Valley, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency at Holyhead, Rhyl RNLI, North Wales Ambulance Service and North West Ambulance Service worked with Gwynt y Môr’s construction staff and specialist Emergency Response Team to carry out the exercise yesterday evening (1715 – 2000).

RWE npower renewables’ Gwynt y Môr Project Director Toby Edmonds said: “These sorts of emergency exercises are vital to ensure our procedures are fully tested and work effectively in the event of a real incident.

“We are very pleased to include the emergency services from across the region in this exercise and will be working with them to ensure any lessons learnt from this exercise are fully incorporated in our procedures going forward.”

Gwynt y Môr has invested in an industry-leading Emergency Response Team which provides critical medical and rescue cover to workers operating in the offshore field during the construction phase.

The team provided by Merseyside based Hughes Sub-Surface Engineering Limited, is believed to be the most highly skilled ever to operate on an offshore renewables project and includes experienced offshore medical technicians.

The Emergency Response Team was working alongside Gwynt y Môr project staff to run the exercise. Project Leader, Phil Keating, said: “We are delighted to be appointed by Gwynt y Môr to provide its emergency response cover.

“All our personnel are certified to the very highest level including emergency medical technician training, offshore survival, confined space training, swift water rescue, rope rescue and advanced climber training.

“This exercise has been devised to reflect what could really happen offshore in an emergency and will be vital in improving our response in the event of a real incident.”

Exercise ARGO contains three different scenarios including retrieving a casualty who has fallen into the sea, winching an injured person from a wind turbine foundation and treating, recovering and taking to hospital onshore a casualty suffering from chest pains.

The Gwynt y Môr Emergency Response Team, situated in the field offshore, was deployed to the scene of the “emergency” immediately.

In addition, the Coastguard was expected to request RAF Valley and Rhyl RNLI to attend the exercise and rescue the casualties.

Matt Crofts, Divisional Operations Manager for North Wales and the North West said: “RNLI volunteers never quite know what they will face when the pagers sound and the call for help comes.

“Training is vital to ensure our volunteers are at the peak of their skills and exercises such as this are invaluable to strengthen our relationship with the other organisations who we may find ourselves working with in the event of a major incident.”

At 576MW, Gwynt y Môr is one of the largest offshore wind farms currently in construction in Europe. It is a shared investment between partners RWE Innogy, Stadtwerke München GmbH and Siemens.

Once fully operational, energy generation from Gwynt y Môr is expected to be equivalent to the average annual needs of around 400,000 homes.

Gwynt y Môr Offshore Wind Farm Limited has awarded contracts worth more than £80 million to companies in Wales.

RWE npower renewables has set up a project information line which people can call if they have a query about the construction of Gwynt y Môr.

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Press release, May 1, 2013; Image: RWE