Batboy
I checked our Safety Report database and found the incidents to which you refer. The oil leak was caused by the seal of the MGB oil filler cap coming off. After takeoff there was a sudden lateral vibration and flickering COWLS light, but on return to the platform nothing was found amiss, and indeed no further maintenance actions were taken after return to the beach, and there was no recurrence of the problem.
So was it safe to make the flight back to the beach - absolutely! Perhaps the vibration was the result of turbulence or some other strange meteorological phenomena, we will never know.
But, if your account is correct, did we handle the passenger relations aspect well? - absolutely not, to put it mildly! Even though it was not my base nor my fleet, on behalf of Bristow I would like to apologise. Next time can I suggest that you raise that sort of thing with your safety reps - we sometimes get questions from concerned passengers routed via their safety reps and are always happy to answer them. Sometimes the questions are ridiculous (ie from people with no idea about aviation) but a question from you on this incident would have been totally justified. We would certainly rather receive the question and be able to answer it, that to have our passengers harbouring the long-term mistrust in our professionalism that this sort of incident can engender.
Since 2006 we have paid more attention to "public relations" ie passenger concerns, and we now have full time staff to ensure its dealt with better. If you PM me, I will give you the name of the lady who is in charge of that department - its never too late to ask!
HC