Fatalities

We are deeply saddened that 26 people (two employees and 24 contractors) lost their lives working for Shell in 2008. That was five more than in 2007, based on the updated scope of our reporting. Of these fatalities, nine happened on the road. A further 10 occurred in Nigeria, three of these as a result of security incidents and the rest in one tragic incident in which seven contractors died when repairing a pipeline after a sabotage incident.

We are maintaining our strong focus on safety and following through with our efforts to strengthen our safety culture. In July 2009, we expect to launch our 12 Life Saving Rules: clear and simple requirements covering the activities of highest safety risk. Following these rules is already mandatory for employees and contractors. The consequences for not following them – maximum appropriate disciplinary action for employees, or removal from Shell sites for contractors – will be strictly enforced at all our operations. We are also continuing to tighten the way we manage process safety, and reduce the number of deaths and injuries on the road.

To align with industry practice, we now focus our reporting on the absolute number of fatalities we have, and no longer report a Fatal Accident Rate (the number of fatalities per 100 million working hours).

• Find out more about our approach to managing safety.