Just five months after the disastrous Deepwater Horizon explosion, there was another industrial accident after an explosion on an oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico last week. Fortunately, all 13 crew members survived the explosion.

The platform is located 80 miles from the coast of Louisiana and is owned by Mariner Energy. The platform is about 250 miles west of the Deepwater Horizon site. According to the New York Times, the platform has been the site of at least four accidents since 2000, including two fires.

While the Obama administration issued a six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling in May following the Deepwater Horizon spill, the Mariner platform is considered a shallow-water platform. The platform works in 340 feet of water, and produced 9.2 million cubic feet of natural gas and 1,400 barrels of crude oil per day.

This new incident has raised even more concerns about oil rig safety.

The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce sent a letter to Mariner's chief executive officer, requesting a report on the industrial accident. U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva, who has been investigating the issue of safety on oil rigs since before the BP oil spill, stated that this most recent incident was a reminder that oil rigs are not safe and are currently not being tested for safety.

According to Greenpeace, there have been more than 858 fires and explosions and 69 people have died on offshore facilities in the last ten years.

Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said, "We don't need to put American workers and waters in harm's way just so multinational oil companies can break more profit records."

Source: UPI.com "Gulf platform fire stirs drilling debate" 9/3/10