Engineer loses most of an arm during offshore wind turbine repair

What happened

In 2018, an engineer lost most of an arm while repairing a turbine blade at an unnamed offshore wind farm in the North Sea. Reporting of a later court case said he had started the work believing the power was off, and that a blade sliced through his arm. A High Court judge was reported to have found the employer mostly responsible and the engineer partly responsible for not double-checking that the power was off. The employer was reported to have updated its equipment and procedures afterwards. The wind farm itself was not named.

Contributing factors

The engineer was reported to have begun the repair thinking the power was off. The court was reported to have said he should have double-checked isolation, and also to have found the employer mostly responsible. The report does not set out the technical detail of the isolation failure.

Lessons learned

1. Isolation should be verified before work starts on a turbine blade, not assumed from an earlier check.
2. Maintenance procedures should require a further check that power is off before a repair begins.
3. After a serious maintenance injury, equipment and procedures should be reviewed promptly.

Source

insideedition.com