Disaster management centre at Bapco to deal with emergencies

Interior Minister, General Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa, and Oil Minister, Shaikh Mohammed bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, yesterday inaugurated the Bahrain Petroleum Company (Bapco) Centre for Leadership to deal with oil-related emergencies and disasters.  Deputy Chairman of the Supreme Council for Environment, Faisal bin Rashid Al Khalifa, and Chief of Public Security and Head of the National Disaster Management Committee, Major-General Tariq Al Hassan, attended the event.

Upon the arrival of Interior Minister, the patron of the ceremony, the launching of the centre took place with a brief by the Deputy CEO of Bapco, Ebrahim Talib about the readiness of the centre to deal with oil spills. He said that as part of efforts to meet the latest developments in responding to emergencies and disasters, the assistant of organisations with high expertise were sought to learn about successful experiences of developed countries.

He continued that a comprehensive team to deal with various cases was formed, and the centre was equipped with the latest technologies for effective responses to accidents. He highlighted that the centre was designed to manage more than one emergency at the same time. After that, Interior Minister toured the centre and was informed about the implementation steps of the national exercise against oil spills that commenced at 7 am on October 23.

The drill is organised by the Interior Ministry, the National Oil and Gas Authority and the Supreme Council for Environment in co-operation with the National Disaster Management Committee. The exercise’s phases, implementation process, scenarios and goals were highlighted. The drill reflects the capability of the participating organisations to work together while fulfilling their duties to enhance preparedness.

On this occasion, the Interior Minister expressed thanks and appreciation to Shaikh Mohammed bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, the Oil Minister, for his sincere efforts in enhancing competencies, productivity and development in all oil-related aspects, along with the performance levels, including reinforcing preparedness to tackle emergencies in the oil sector. He valued the role of Bapco that reflects the level of competency and training as a national platform to develop expertise and leaders, as well as its contributions to the building of the nation.

He highlighted that the national exercise with a scenario of a threat that targets an oil establishment comes at a time with unprecedented challenges. “As we see, there is a clear targeting of oil establishments in the region,” he said, asserting the importance of field training to learn skills to deal with emergencies. He valued the exercise for being a realistic and the competency and capabilities of the participating organisations, through their co-operation and co-ordination in planning and implementation.

He hailed the high readiness through the drills phases that is considered as the accumulated experience and efforts in the field of capacity building, whether at the human level or concerning modern equipment and techniques used in dealing with emergencies per the latest international emergency plans. He highlighted the essentiality to build on such exercises as part of joint fieldwork.

The Interior Minister said that the centre that was inaugurated would have positive outcomes to supervise the control operations to deal with oil-related emergencies. He stressed the importance of co-operation and co-ordination among all the participating organisations to gain expertise to enhance readiness.