Piper Alpha was a North Sea oil production platform which came into service in 1976, first as an oil platform and then later converted to gas production. An explosion and resulting fire destroyed it on July 6, 1988.

A total of 167 people died in the Piper Alpha fire making it the world's worst offshore oil disaster.

In March 2005 an explosion ripped through a BP oil refinery in Texas City, Texas, killing 15 workers and injuring over 100. After the disaster DNA profiling was considered as a means of identifying the large contract labour force.

More recently the Deepwater Horizon explosion of April 20th 2010 which killed 11 men in the Gulf of Mexico led to what has become the world's largest accidental marine oil spill. This environmental disaster is now considered the second largest in U.S. history, behind the Dust Bowl.