BP, THE British oil group, had a “checkbook mentality” towards safety and was aware of maintenance backlogs and unsafe equipment at its Texas City refinery years before the fire there in 2005 in which 15 workers died, according to findings by American safety officials.

Preliminary findings by investigators at the US Chemical Safety Board (CSB), published yesterday, show a history of serious accidents and fatalities at the plant for years before the catastrophe. However, the company failed to undertake preventative maintenance programmes, said Carolyn Merritt, the board’s chairman.

“Unsafe and antiquated equipment designs were left in place, and unacceptable deficiencies in preventative maintenance were tolerated,” she said.

BP’s response to its own findings of safety problems was confined to procedural compliance “while catastrophic safety risks remained”, she said.

Safety was compromised by a succession of budget cuts, Ms Merritt said. The company implemented a 25 per cent cut on fixed costs between 1998 and 2000 which adversely affected maintenance expenditure at the refinery.

“Every successful corporation must contain its costs. But at an ageing facility like Texas City, it is not responsible to cut budgets related to safety and maintenance without thoroughly examining the impact on the risk of a catastrophic accident,” she said.

The CSB is not a regulator and has no powers to prosecute or fine companies for safety failings but its findings are likely to be scrutinised closely by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) which is believed to be investigating the Texas City disaster.

The US attorney’s office in Galveston is reported to have made efforts to curtail the discovery process in civil trials relating to victims of the fire. Such activity is thought to reveal the DoJ’s interest in ensuring thay it has prior access to key witnesses.

BP said yesterday that its own report, published in December 2005, acknowledged that the accident was preventable but a spokesman added: “We do not understand the basis of many of the statements made by CSB. We are going to defer comment until they issue a final written report.”

BP has paid a record fine of $21 million (£11 million) following a series of indictments by Osha, the US health and safety regulator, which the company did not dispute.

The CSB is expected today to make further statements and recommendations concerning the Texas City fire.

The explosion on March 23, 2005 was caused when refinery staff attempted to restart an isomerisation unit and overfilled a distillation tower with flammable hydrocarbons.

A geyser of liquids and vapour vented into the air and ignited, causing explosions and fires. According to the CSB, alarms and gauges that should have warned of overfilling failed to operate.

Don Holmstrom, the CSB supervisory investigator, said that he found evidence of eight previous instances of hydrocarbon discharges between 1994 and 2004, two of which caused fires.

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