The oil and gas industry has spent large amounts of money on training and development courses in order to reduce the number of accidents that happen on the job, Joe Hurt, vice-president of the International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC), has commented.

Speaking to the Times-Picayune, he explained that oil training must be developed continuously in order to ensure that risk is lowered for those working in both the onshore and offshore sector.

His comments came after a helicopter shipping Shell workers to a rig in the Mexican Gulf crashed, resulting in eight fatalities.

However, David Frost, a safety manager at Shell, noted that the company has seen the number of injuries and fatalities drop significantly with the increased provision of safety training courses.

"Safety is just something you've got to constantly work at. You can't do it a little bit and say, 'OK, we've got it fixed'," added Mr Hurt.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation.

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