Helicopters to oil rigs .

[grumpy52]

I noticed plenty of helicopters about off the East Anglian coast today .
Mainly from Bristows and seem to be out of Norwich.
Is this all for oil rigs ?
I do know that lots of rig work happens along this coast as I have moved loads of spares for the oil industry in the past .
I think at one point there were at least 6 in the air at the same time .
Is this normal shift change on the rigs ?

[Steve vRS]

Yes, I’ve flown to platforms from Norwich before. Not as many manned installations in the southern North Sea now as there used to be but still a few operators there, mainly gas production.

[saknog]

Most of these are going to a Normally Unmanned instillation (NUI), so take workers out in the morning and pick them up in the afternoon leaving the platform unmanned overnight

[Siko]

I fly offshore helicopters for a living out of Shetland (not for much longer sadly) and similar up here, crew change flights as normal but numbers of flights down varying amounts.

[Steve vRS]

A lot of operators have gone to single occupancy cabins for core crew or safety critical work only so the numbers going back and forth will be down. The virus and low oil price are huge problems.

[CornishRob]

Wind farms are using helis now as well.

Crew changes during construction from platforms / ships and for maintenance.