At least two workers died today as an oil maintenance platform tilted over the sea off Mexico's east coast, forcing the evacuation of 101 employees, the Pemex energy firm said.
The jackup rig, owned by a Pemex contractor named Typhoon Offshore, began to list in the Sound of Campeche area of the Gulf of Mexico after a "failure" in one of its movable legs, the company said in a statement.
Three Pemex employees and 98 Typhoon employees were removed from the platform, which was still tilting in the early afternoon.
The platform was positioning itself to conduct maintenance work for the wells of another rig when it began to lean. A jackup rig has movable legs that can raise its hull over the sea.
"Regrettably, two external company workers were reported dead, and another was injured," Pemex said.
In another incident in the same area last month, a Pemex rig caught fire on the Sound of Campeche, killing four workers and leaving three missing.
A Pemex spokesman was unable to give details about Typhoon.
Typhoon appears to have a website that lists a Mexico City address and telephone number, but a woman answering the phone said nobody was available for comment.
The website says Troll Solution flies the flag of the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu and was built in 2010. It has three movable legs, a crane and a helipad.
The company was incorporated in 2013 to "satisfy demand in the Gulf of Mexico for heavy well intervention and workovers" as well as maintenance of platforms, the website says.
