'We believe it is the right thing to do,' Steven Newman said in a statement. | REUTERS Transocean execs to donate bonuses

Senior Transocean officials announced Tuesday that they will donate their much-lambasted safety bonuses to a memorial fund for the victims of last year’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

In a potential saving-grace move for the company, Transocean CEO Steven Newman and other senior officials are giving away more than $250,000 in bonuses granted for the company’s safety performance in 2010 despite being the operator of the Deepwater Horizon rig, which exploded April 20, killing 11 workers.


“The executive team made this decision because we believe it is the right thing to do,” Newman said in a statement. “Nothing is more important to Transocean than our people, and it was never our intent to diminish the effect the Macondo tragedy has had on those who lost loved ones.”

He added, “We offer our most sincere apologies and we regret the impact this matter has had on the entire Transocean family.”

The company's bonuses — and even worse, its rationale — earned ridicule from Democrats and Republicans alike, including Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Senate Energy and Natural Resources ranking member Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

“To suggest that it’s an exemplary safety record in view of what has happened in the past year and their involvement, I just think it’s inappropriate and just unfortunate,” Murkowski told POLITICO on Monday. “If I were Transocean and an executive there, I sure wouldn’t be suggesting that our safety record is exemplary but for our role with 11 deaths. Excuse me, that’s just not right."

The bonuses were detailed in a filing Friday to the Securities and Exchange Commission, first reported by the Wall Street Journal on Saturday.

"Notwithstanding the tragic loss of life in the Gulf of Mexico, we achieved an exemplary statistical safety record as measured by our total recordable incident rate ('TRIR') and total potential severity rate ('TPSR')," Transocean wrote. "As measured by these standards, we recorded the best year in safety performance in our Company's history, which is a reflection on our commitment to achieving an incident free environment, all the time, everywhere."

At a federal hearing investigating the spill in New Orleans on Monday, Transocean Executive Vice President Ihab Toma said the wording "may have been insensitive."

Toma and Newman are among those senior officials who received — and are now donating — safety bonuses.

The bonuses are going into the Deepwater Horizon Memorial Fund Transocean established for the families of the 11 workers. The non-deductible sum being donated by the senior executive team will exceed $250,000, according to the company. More than $1.6 million has been distributed by the memorial fund so far, the company said.

This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 7:43 p.m. on April 5, 2011.