Prospector 5 rig sinks off Gabon, five people reported missing

The Prospector 5 jack-up drilling rig, owned and operated by Borr Drilling, sank during preparations for a drilling campaign at the Dussafu Marin licence offshore Gabon. Borr’s October 25 statement said the incident occurred at approximately 20:37 local time on October 24 while the rig was jacking up. The rig was contracted to support BW Energy’s drilling operations in the area.

Borr said preliminary information indicated a punch-through event during preload activities, followed by loss of stability and the rig’s sinking. That is the contractor’s initial account after the incident, not a final determination of cause. BW Energy also confirmed that the rig lost stability and sank during preparations for the planned campaign.

In statements issued on October 25, the companies said 110 of the 115 people aboard had been accounted for and five remained missing. Borr said its onshore emergency response team had been activated and was coordinating with local authorities and customer BW Energy to support search and rescue. BW Energy said it was working with the contractor, authorities and emergency responders. These figures describe the status reported in those dated statements; they do not establish a later rescue or investigation outcome.

The incident involved the mobile jack-up rig preparing for drilling, not the MaBoMo production facility itself. BW Energy said production at MaBoMo had been shut down under standard procedure during drilling preparations. It reported no damage to that facility or its related equipment and no accidental discharge of harmful substances to the sea from the facility. That statement is specific to MaBoMo and is not a wider environmental assessment of the sunken rig.

Panoro Energy said in its October 25 statement that it holds a 17.5% non-operated participating interest in Dussafu. BW Energy operates the licence, while Borr owns and operates the Prospector 5 rig. The three companies’ statements document their different roles and operational information; they refer to the same rig incident, not separate events.

For now, the reported operational effects are the continuing search and rescue response and the pause in drilling preparations and MaBoMo production. Borr’s preliminary description points to the preload phase, but the statements do not provide the findings of an independent technical investigation, the condition of the rig on the seabed or a date for operations to resume.