Stay with me forever’

Life was good for many youngsters in Aberdeen in the 1980s.

The discovery of vast reserves of oil in the North Sea in the previous decade transformed the city away from industries such as fishing and farming and was a catalyst for rapid change in the north-east.

While the oil boom brought riches for some, there were others who felt that the rapid expansion was built on a culture of profits before people and silver before safety.

As north-east Labour MSP Lewis Macdonald put it: “Before the Piper Alpha disaster, there was a Wild West culture offshore. Producing more oil more quickly seemed to be all that mattered, macho behaviour was the order of the day, health and safety concerns were suppressed and trade unions struggled to win recognition.”

In the mid-1970s, such views were not commonly heard. When Piper Alpha, the giant platform operated by Occidental Petroleum, sprung to life in 1976, it was hailed as the latest chapter in a burgeoning success story.

Little thought had gone into the question of what might happen in the event of an accident far out to sea.

Occidental continued to plough ahead with major construction, maintenance and upgrade works.

Despite the complex schedule, and fears expressed by trade unions, the firm made the decision to continue operating the platform and not shut it down, as was previously planned.

That perfect storm of system failures and technical problems was directly responsible for the terrible events that