
This initiative aims to document the experience of survivors and the bereaved as well as the work of the Kielland network in the wake of the loss of the converted rig off Norway roughly 43 years ago.
The mandate for the project is to:
- collect documentation as well as to acquire and make publicly available knowledge about the Alexander L Kielland accident, to shed light on the incident, and to lay the basis for research projects, articles, exhibitions, books, cultural activities and so forth.
- help ensure that the bereaved, survivors and others affected by the Alexander L Kielland feel that they are seen, heard and taken seriously – and that answers are found as far as possible to their questions.
A total of NOK 8 million has been appropriated by the Ministry of Labour and Social Inclusion and the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy to fund the project for a three-year period. This follows a decision by the Storting (parliament) in June 2021 after a report from the Auditor General of Norway concerning the official response to the disaster.
The project will run until February 2025. A professional documentation capability and an independent approach are being applied by the museum, both to its work with sources and in relation to other participants in the project.
Memory bank
“Part of our work on documentation involves acquiring the stories of these involved with the disaster,” explains project manager Else M Tungland.

With a background as a social scientist, she has previously written and contributed to several books about the loss of the Alexander L Kielland, which capsized in the North Sea with the loss of 123 of the 212 people on board. Only 89 survived.
“Many people have already been interviewed, and their stories are published in the Minnebank Alexander L Kielland-ulykken (Memory bank for the Alexander L Kielland accident) at the university library in Stavanger,” Tungland reports.
The memory bank (in Norwegian only) is available at the university library’s website:
Minnebank Alexander L. Kielland-ulykken
Most of the interviewees so far have been Norwegian, but the accommodation rig also had foreigners on board when the accident happened – including 34 British citizens, of whom 23 died and 11 survived.
The documentation project has established contact with half of the survivors or bereaved from this contingent, and two visits were paid to the UK in 2022 when Tungland met the bereaved. Interviews with these people will also be published in the memory bank, subject to the consent of the interviewees.
Photographs, objects and other documentation which people may have kept privately are also of interest to the project.
“We want to hear from everyone who has something they want to share,” says Tungland.
Kielland gathering
From 31 August to 2 September there will be a “Kielland gathering” in Stavanger, where relatives, survivors and others who were affected by the accident are invited.
You can find more information and programme for the gathering on this link:
Kielland gathering 31.8 – 2.9.2023
Contact
Else M Tungland, project manager
E-mail: else@norskolje.museum.no