Shell Engineering- a worrying example of the company's low standards

national | rights, freedoms and repression | news report

Monday October 16, 2006 01:01

by Shell to Sea

If they can't even close the windows in the head office- should we trust that the pipeline won't leak?

Last Wedneday, when protesters who are opposed to the destructive scheme that Shell and their partners the Irish Government, Statoil, and Marathon Oil want to impose by force on the people of Erris, scaled the roof of Corrib House, they were surprised to find that the building has windows that don't seem to lock.

Several members of Shell's staff tried various options for keeping the window that faces out onto the roof closed, but all proved useless. At one point there were five different men all trying to shut one window (presumably in case one of the scary protesters tried to force their way in through it).

Nobody in the company proved able to mend the broken catch, and as the protest gathered attention, the staff got more and more irritated with the window. Perhaps they realise that the fact that they can't organise window catches that work, doesn't exactly build confidence in their abilities to build and run an extremely high-pressure raw gas pipeline through a bog...

The window is a bit dodgy, but the pipeline will be safe, honest...

Eventually they realised that they should just leave a member of their staff guarding the window. I wonder if he thought that was what he'd be doing when he got the plane from England.

Of course when the cops arrived, they were put in charge of window guarding duties. Shell's philosophy these days is why use your own staff when you've got the whole Irish police force at your disposal.

Up on the roof