Equinor Prepares Visund Repairs as North Sea Platform Remains Shut

(Credit: David Burke / Equinor)

Equinor crews are preparing to fix the company's Visund gas and oil platform, which remain offline following a fire earlier this week, a spokesperson for the Norwegian group said on Friday.

The North Sea Visund platform shut production on Wednesday due to a fire in an electrical system and is currently scheduled to stay offline until November 16, according to a market message published via Gassco, but the duration is subject to revision.

"No new updates so far in terms of schedule for re-start of production or return of crew as of now," the Equinor spokesperson said in an emailed statement.

The are currently 36 people on board, compared with 128 at the time of the incident, conducting logistical tasks and securing the area where the fire took place, the spokesperson said.

The next steps will be repairs and preparations for start-up, he added.

The Visund platform, which mostly produces gas, can deliver 13.2 million cubic metres (mcm) of natural gas per day, according to Gassco, equal to around 3.7% of Norway's export capacity.

Visund is owned by Equinor (53.2%), Petoro (30%), ConocoPhillips (9.1%) and Repsol (7.7%).

(Reuters - Reporting by Nora Buli, editing by Terje Solsvik)