Flight to Goodwyn script
I wake about 5 am. I head to the airport. I get onboard Qantas flight heading to Karratha
Get on a helicopter and head out to Goodwyn.
Why am going out to Goodwyn, I’m going out to Goodwyn attend the platform health and safety Committee meeting but also they have asked me to do an audit of the permit to work system.
I attended the meeting and I start the audit. The days progressing and it’s about 4:30 in the afternoon. The afternoon helicopter comes in to land, passengers alight, and more passengers get on. The helicopter starts to leave the helideck. Pilot notices a fault indication light in cockpit he’s not exactly issue what the problem is. He hopes it’s just an instrumentation problem, but he’s concerns it’s something more serious, so rather than take off he decides to hover about a meter above the helideck and try to work out what the problem is
Has he’s hovering there the downdraft from the helicopter is acting on a box, the box is about 7 kg. and it sitting in the shelter of the helideck
The box contains a light fitting, it’s there because the following day it’s going to be fitted the helideck structure, and it’s been located a there until its time to fit the box
About the same time, I need to go and check one last permit as part of the audit I am doing. I start to leave the accommodation module, as I start to leave the accommodation module the downdraft from the helicopter picks up the box and throws it over the handrail and it drops 30 meters hits me on the head fractures my scull, breaks my neck, I’m killed instantly.
As is required the platform emergency response team mobilized, because there has been a fatality the WA police service is notified
It’s about 6:30 in the evening, my kids they’ve had their dinner, they’ve had their bath and in their pajamas and the front door bell goes. There exited, maybe dads come home early, may be a friends come around to play. So they rush down to the front door, it’s not dad, it’s not a friend, it’s a female police officer and the Woodside PS reporter. My wife Trish walks down the hallway, she see the uniform, her mind starts to race, I wonder what’s happened, perhaps there’s been a car accident in the street, perhaps one of the neighbors have been broken into
She greets the visitors and they go to the lounge room. The police officer starts talking. Mrs. Sim it’s concerning your husband, Alan. I got some bad news, it’s very very worst news. What’s the very very worst news you can give to somebody.
The tears start to flow. The police officer continues, I am sorry to inform you your husband Alan was killed in an accident offshore two hours ago, my sincere condolences.
Tears, uncontrollable tears. A feeling of sick in the pit of your stomach that wasn’t there a minute ago but it’s there now
Those young happy faces are no longer happy.
What are they thinking, they’re confused, and who are these people? Who are these strangers sitting in my lounge room? Why are they making my mommy so upset? I want my daddy.
They start to scream I want my daddy, cause of the middle of the night when they had a nightmare and woke up I was there for them. I went in I picked them up, I scared the monsters away and I told them everything was gonna be ok, and it was. When they fell and injured themselves, I picked them up. I dusted them down. I kissed the wound better and I sent them on their way
When the young emotions threaten to overwhelm them, I held them close. I put their head on my shoulder and they fell as sleep in my arms, but I’m not there, and I’m not coming back, ever again. It’s brutal, and it’s violent, there’s no visitations to the hospital. There is no sitting down with the children, talking to them, getting them to come to terms with the fact one day daddy going to go to heaven to be with granny and granddad. I’m just not coming back, ever again.
And what do I miss out on
First day at school, first date senior school, first boyfriend, first girlfriend, first wild love affair, first hangover, first time you smoke a joint, first date university, graduation, first date in the work force, marriage, grandchildren. I miss out on everything, everything.
And why? the bereaved, grieving they all need to know why. They need answers. They need to get to closure because somebody thought it will be ok. Somebody thought that box would be ok. Tell my fatherless children. Tell the parents who grieve for a lost son. Tell the wife that’s had to bury a husband. And why do I tell you this? Because the responsibility you bear me, I bear you.
For it wasn’t me that was killed in that accident, it was you that was killed in that accident ,and it wasn’t you to saw that box and did nothing about it, it was me. Cause that day when I arrived on Goodwyn, when I walked down from the helideck, I saw that box there and I saw it wasn’t secure, and for one fleeting moment I thought I should do something about.
I should tell somebody but I didn’t. I walked pass. Why didn’t I do something about it? Why didn’t I tell somebody? Why didn’t I secure that box? Cause I didn’t have the courage to do it. I didn’t have courage to report it. I didn’t have courage to secure that box. So now I ask myself, do I have courage to look your children in the eye? Do I have courage to look your wife, your husband in the eye? Do I have courage to look you parents in the eye? And every day thereafter, when I wake up in the morning would I have the courage to look at myself in the eye. Cause if I don’t have that courage, then I’d better have courage to do something about that dam box
The incident details I describe actually occurred on Goodwyn in September 2000