Offshore board to release chopper safety report

The Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board says it will make a report from an inquiry on helicopter safety public as soon as it receives it.

A spokesperson with the Offshore Helicopter Safety Inquiry said Monday that the report including Commissioner Robert Wells's recommendations on how to improve offshore helicopter safety should be delivered to the board Nov. 8.

The inquiry was set up by the C-NLOPB after a helicopter ferrying workers to offshore oil platforms east of St. John's crashed on March 12, 2009. Fifteen passengers and two helicopter crewmembers died after the chopper hit the ocean.

Wells is a retired Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador judge.

In a news release Monday, the C-NLOPB said it will make the inquiry's report available on its website the same day it receives it, but the board won't comment publicly until after it has reviewed the report.

An inquiry spokesperson said Wells completed his report in October, but it has taken some time to get it to a printer and have it printed.