“I have to win their confidence”

Lodewijk found out how extremely dangerous oil exploration can be back when he was a greenhorn in the offshore sector. During a test drilling 17 years ago – on his second shift ever on an oil rig – the drill hit a pocket of gas which pushed itself up to the surface with an enormous force and ignited, turning into a huge cloud of fire.

The cloud of fire reached a diameter of about 30 metres, and Lodewijk still clearly remembers what it looked like. He also clearly remembers how they succeeded in pushing back the cloud with water so that two men could get in and cover up the hole manually.

“It was an extremely dangerous situation, but it ended well. I was really afraid while it was going on. I was afraid I was going to die,” says the Dutch Falck employee about the experience which gave him so much respect for safety on board an oil rig.

“The topics we deal with are dead serious”

His experience working in the dangerous environment of the offshore sector forms an important background for Lodewijk’s past seven years working as a fire instructor at Falck’s large training centre at Maasvlakte in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Here he primarily trains employees from the oil industry and seamen from large shipping companies.

He believes it is an advantage that he once worked on an oil rig himself and knows what it is like to work with the waves right outside your door.

“This experience increases the course attendees’ confidence in me, and I have to win their confidence if I want the training I give them to really make a difference. Although the atmosphere at our courses is very pleasant, the topics we deal with are dead serious – the course attendees are a risk to themselves and their colleagues if they do not learn what they should,” adds the 43-year-old fire instructor.

The perfect illusion

The training centre at Maasvlakte is one of Falck’s many training centres in the countries around the North Sea. We also have training centres in Malaysia, Brazil and Trinidad and Tobago. The centres are designed in such a way that it is possible to create an almost perfect illusion of real ship catastrophes, fires and explosions.

“The only thing we lack is real emotions. No matter how life-like we can make the surroundings, course attendees still know very well that they are in a training situation. But we try to put them under pressure; we play the role to the full. Only in that way can we give them an idea of what they will be up against in real life,” says Lodewijk.

“If things go wrong on an oil rig, they can go terribly, horribly wrong. And they cannot just call somebody to come and help them out. They have to handle the situation themselves. That’s why it is so important that everybody on board knows precisely what to do in an emergency situation. That’s what we teach them and train them in here,” Lodewijk points out.

Overcoming fear

He often has course attendees who feel uncomfortable with the situation when they practice rescue techniques wearing a smoke helmet. Many of them feel that they can’t breathe or they feel claustrophobic when they get the mask on.

“Then I try to ‘hold their hand’ to make them overcome their fear. If they can’t handle it, then they can’t fulfil their obligations in the emergency response setup, and then they no longer have a job. So I am naturally very glad when somebody says to me after a course that they wouldn’t have been able to complete the course without my support.”