Gulf oil spill

[Poppinsme]

And here is the article about the Blow Out Preventer(BOP).

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/bps_internal_probe_finds_sever.html

"The BP investigation also confirmed many of the concerns raised by the subcommittee about problems with the blowout preventer, which was supposed to be the fail-safe system that would keep the well from blowing as it did."

"The BOP problems confirmed by BP include "the failure of its emergency disconnect system, the failure of its automated mode function or deadman switch, the failure of the BOP's shearing functions, and the failure of the remote operated vehicle interventions"

Lots of failures.

 

[luvsJack]

http://www.wwltv.com/news/gulf-oil-...-moments-before-after-explosion-94964369.html

Please read this article.

lxtoc I oil spill-1979. 2nd largest oil spill in the gulf of of Mexico and the world.
Took 9-10 months to cap and Red Adair was brought in to help.
Texas had over 2 months to get ready for the spill to reach there shores.
162 miles of beach were affected and over 140,000,000 gallons of oil reached Texas.

Here in Louisiana we don't have 2 months to get ready.
39,000,000 gallons have already leaked in only 5 weeks.

That is the first article I have actually read about this thing. It made me cry to read what those men were going through. A young man that graduated from high school with my son and played baseball with him--he was the right fielder, ds the center fielder was on that rig and went through that hell on earth. He made it off alive,thank God.

According to that article, something was in place to shut down the well and they waited too long to use it. The man in the position to shut down that well should have the final call, not have to wait for approval. Those few seconds made a huge difference.

Obviously there was a disagreement between rig workers and company men. The rig employees are ALWAYS going to be the ones to listen to in that case. Certainly not someone who doesn't do the work everyday. These men are there with their hands in it for 14-21 days every month. They know the danger they are in and are dang sure not going to do anything to make it more dangerous. Most of the men that are drillers or toolpushers on the rigs have been doing that work their entire lives, they know what they are doing; but too many times someone comes in to try and show them a "better" way or a "cheaper" way. Obviously that isn't always the best way.

 

[Terry36]

Thank you Poppinsme for bringing the LOCAL stories to our fellow Dismen and Disladies.

 

[Poppinsme]

Pressure problems noted about 20 minutes before Deepwater Horizon explosion

May 27, 2010, 7:57PM

Drillers on the Deepwater Horizon began having trouble with pressure from the Macondo well about 20 minutes before the fatal explosions that killed 11 workers, destroyed the rig and caused the largest oil spill in U.S. history. But no one tried to shut off the well until after the fire erupted, according to testimony from several survivors at hearings Thursday in Kenner.
New testimony from Chief Mate David Young raised questions about why the well wasn't shut down before a kick of gas shot up the rig's riser, spewing mud and seawater and taking the vessel's senior officers by surprise. The top two Transocean officers on the rig at the time testified Thursday that anyone who had a concern about safety could have called a "timeout" to shut off a well that might go out of control, but that was never done
A joint investigative panel of the Coast Guard and Minerals Management Service held its fourth day of hearings to determine what went wrong on April 20. The hearings have been long and complex because of the technical nature of the drilling industry and because several companies' employees played a role in the disaster; BP owned the well, but leased the rig from Switzerland-based Transocean, which provided most of the rig workers. Halliburton was hired to place cement seals in the well, M-I SWACO provided drilling mud, Schlumberger had a team on the rig to run tests and other companies provided key pieces of equipment.

Young, whose job included providing cement slurry to Halliburton contractors, said he stopped by the rig's drill floor about 9:30 p.m. on April 20 to see when they would need the cement. He said he found drilling supervisor Jason Anderson and chief driller Dewey Revette there, trying to analyze some problematic pressure readings from down in the well.

Anderson and Revette were among the workers killed in the accident

"They had a concern with differential pressure," Young said. "They said it would be a little longer to figure it out, for the cement job meeting. They were seeing a differential pressure. I didn't ask any questions about it."

Young said that after he went to another office to report that the cement job would be delayed, he heard a release of gas. "I knew something was up so I went to the bridge," he said.

Also on the bridge was the rig's master, Curt Kuchta, who was giving a tour to BP executives who had flown in to celebrate the rig's safety record. Kuchta testified the VIPs were "basically playing a video game," using a simulator of rig controls on the bridge that was usually used for crew training. The other top officer on the rig, offshore installation manager Jimmy Harrell, was in the shower when the first of several explosions happened about 9:49 p.m., he testified.

It wasn't until Harrell stumbled out of the shower, put on some clothes, arrived on the bridge and consulted with Kuchta that the captain said he ordered the activation of shear rams on the blowout preventer and the emergency disconnect system at 9:56 p.m., according to their testimony.


Harrell said he believed the explosions somehow disabled the blowout preventer's control panel and the emergency disconnect system, neither of which worked.
Young wrote in a statement to Coast Guard investigators immediately after being rescued that the drillers were "having well issues," but he testified Thursday that he didn't realize that meant they "had lost control of the well."

Capt. Hung Nguyen, chairman of the joint Coast Guard and Minerals Management Service investigative panel, has raised concerns in the hearings about a lack of clarity over who was ultimately in charge on the oil rig. Noting that Transocean puts the offshore installation manager in charge when the unit is drilling, and that the captain is in charge when the vessel is "under way," Nguyen said that neither top official seemed to have "visibility" of the events that led to the disaster.

Harrell testified that BP was constantly changing the well plan over the final days, including the significant addition of a 9 7/8-inch metal casing that tapered to 7 inches at the bottom and lined the inside of the well.

A draft of BP's internal investigation, which was released Tuesday by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, says that particular casing suffered a "loss of integrity" and "created a path" for gas to shoot up to the rig.

Harrell said cement used to close in the casing was infused with nitrogen, and it was the first time he'd ever seen this relatively new type of faster-curing cement used at such depths. He said he'd heard of problems with nitrogen getting into the well and acknowledged he may have reacted to the planned use of that type of cement by saying, "Well, I guess that's what we have those pinchers for," referring to the last-ditch shear rams that would be needed to shut the well in an emergency.

But when pressed, he denied being worried about the cement plan

Harrell also said he was handed a plan on the morning of the disaster that called for his crew to displace drilling mud with lighter seawater without conducting a critical negative pressure test on the well. Harrell said he would never do such a thing and discussed it with BP's company man, Robert Kaluza.

 

[Poppinsme]

Part Two.


He was ultimately successful at getting BP to authorize the negative pressure test and, in fact, the test was performed twice.


Harrell said he was happy with the results of both tests, which, ideally, would have shown no drilling mud being returned to the rig. BP's internal investigation said the initial test, done several hours before the accident, showed a return of 15 barrels, when "normal compressibility" is 5 barrels. The BP report said the second test showed no more than 3 barrels returned.

Through it all, Harrell said he wasn't concerned

Kaluza was scheduled to testify at Thursday's hearing, but declined by invoking his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself. His lawyer, Shaun Clarke, professed Kaluza's innocence Wednesday.

The other BP company man on the rig at the time, Donald Vidrine, also was scheduled to testify but postponed until July, citing an illness, Nguyen said.

In testimony before Congress earlier this month, Tim Probert, a top executive for cement contractor Halliburton, said that if there's any concern with pressure tests, a rig should do a definitive test of the well's cement job, called a cement bond log.

But BP sent home a crew it had on stand-by to run that test without performing it. A spokesman for the testing contractor, Schlumberger, said his firm's crew was sent home at 11 a.m. on the day of the accident, more than six hours before the first negative pressure test was ever run

Harrell also testified that BP decided not to run a bottoms-up test, which takes a sample of the drilling mud from the deepest part of the well to measure pressures and temperatures there. Donald Godwin, an attorney for Halliburton, asked Harrell if he was aware that Halliburton had "recommended running substantially more mud than BP decided to run," but Harrell said he was not aware of that and wasn't concerned about the lack of a bottoms-up test.


Other testimony Thursday turned one of the great ironies of the accident on its head. It's been widely reported that top BP and Transocean executives were visiting the rig to congratulate its crew on seven years without any lost-time accidents, and that was confirmed by the rig workers who testified Wednesday and Thursday in Kenner. But Jason Mathews, representing Minerals Management Service on the investigative panel, introduced MMS records that showed the rig had in fact reported a lost-time accident in August 2008, although the witnesses all said they weren't aware of it.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

http://www.wwltv.com/news/gulf-oil-...-moments-before-after-explosion-94964369.html

Please read this article.

lxtoc I oil spill-1979. 2nd largest oil spill in the gulf of of Mexico and the world.
Took 9-10 months to cap and Red Adair was brought in to help.
Texas had over 2 months to get ready for the spill to reach there shores.
162 miles of beach were affected and over 140,000,000 gallons of oil reached Texas.

Here in Louisiana we don't have 2 months to get ready.
39,000,000 gallons have already leaked in only 5 weeks.

OK, I read the article. I don't see anything in it that contradicted what I said. It certainly paints a bleak picture of what appears to be BP's decision to remove the mud before cementing the well. We've heard from the TransOcean people. I'm going to wait until I've heard from everyone before I start passing judgment.

My point about the Ixtoc spill is that it's effects have essentially disappeared in the intervening three decades. In fact, they were scarcely noticeable 10 years after the event, even in Mexico, where they did not have 2 months notice. The conditions are different (rocky shoreline and sandy beaches vs wetlands). I don't know whether that will make it better or worse for LA. I'm sure that in 10 years you will still be able to find pockets of sludge and tar balls. I'm also confident that by then the shrimping and fishing will have resumed.

I don't want to give the impressions that I don't think this is a terrible tragedy. It's awful. It has severely damaged the Gulf. I live near, play in, and earn money from the Gulf. I'm not happy about it at all. The accident cost 11 people their lives. It's terrible for people that live and work near the Gulf. It's terrible for the environment of the Gulf. It's terrible for our energy security. It's terrible for people that enjoy Gulf shrimp. It's terrible for a lot of people in a lot of ways. I just don't think that it is as bad as some people are portraying it.

The swifter than expected recovery from the similar Ixtoc spill gives me hope. My confidence in our justice system gives my hope that the appropriate people will pay and receive compensation. I don't think that things will ever be made perfect, but that's never the case when accidents happen.

 

[portocall]

There is a huge difference between going onto a rocky shoreline and the wetlands. The wetlands were already disappearing at an alarming rate. This is going to speed the process by killing the seagrass that helps hold them together. I shudder at the thought of needing to redraw the US map sooner rather than later to show what is left of Louisiana when this is over. It is going to take way more than ten years to get over this one. If a tropical system heads this way, I can't imagine how horrific it will be.

The whole thing is terribly sad and beyond scary. The very slow motion response is adding to the anxiety. It is too late to worry about the should've, would've, could've. Now we need to deal with it. I think that this is an industry that should never be deregulated again. The impact is too great and obviously the corporations can't be trusted to be as safe as possible.

 

[Lanshark]

There is a huge difference between going onto a rocky shoreline and the wetlands. The wetlands were already disappearing at an alarming rate. This is going to speed the process by killing the seagrass that helps hold them together. I shudder at the thought of needing to redraw the US map sooner rather than later to show what is left of Louisiana when this is over. It is going to take way more than ten years to get over this one. If a tropical system heads this way, I can't imagine how horrific it will be.

The whole thing is terribly sad and beyond scary. The very slow motion response is adding to the anxiety. It is too late to worry about the should've, would've, could've. Now we need to deal with it. I think that this is an industry that should never be deregulated again. The impact is too great and obviously the corporations can't be trusted to be as safe as possible.

I agree

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I think that this is an industry that should never be deregulated again.

The offshore oil drilling industry was, is, and will continue to be regulated. The question is not whether we should regulate but how to do so to provide the greatest net benefit to society.

We regulate the nuclear industry very tightly because of the huge potential risks. We regulate our nuclear industry much more tightly than the French. As a consequence, we have far less of our energy generated from nuclear power plants at, presumable, a lower level of risk. Our regulations are so restrictive that no new nuclear power plants have been built in decades. We could do the same thing with the Gulf.

We could put drilling restrictions that are so restrictive that we don't drill at all. That would certainly prevent future oil spills (except from Mexico), but it would also cause us to lose roughly 1/4 of our domestically produced oil either driving up prices or causing us to increase our imports. It would also cost a lot of jobs, especially in many of the same areas already hit by the spill.

 

[portocall]

The offshore oil drilling industry was, is, and will continue to be regulated. The question is not whether we should regulate but how to do so to provide the greatest net benefit to society.

We regulate the nuclear industry very tightly because of the huge potential risks. We regulate our nuclear industry much more tightly than the French. As a consequence, we have far less of our energy generated from nuclear power plants at, presumable, a lower level of risk. Our regulations are so restrictive that no new nuclear power plants have been built in decades. We could do the same thing with the Gulf.

We could put drilling restrictions that are so restrictive that we don't drill at all. That would certainly prevent future oil spills (except from Mexico), but it would also cause us to lose roughly 1/4 of our domestically produced oil either driving up prices or causing us to increase our imports. It would also cost a lot of jobs, especially in many of the same areas already hit by the spill.

My father-in-law designed oil rigs for a living. He was able to tell us exactly what went wrong and caused the explosion long before BP did. He was exactly right too. And like many have already pointed out... it was extremely preventable. By that... there needs to be tighter regulations. Not regulate to the point of no drilling. (deregulation doesn't have to mean there are no regulations) But it can be done safely, it should be done safely, and there is no need for another preventable accident. Remember that a simple piece (pricey one at that) and properly cured concrete is all that it would have taken to make us not be havng this discussion in the first place.

As far as the jobs go, many have already been lost and will continue to be lost in the same areas already hit by the spill. I am more fearful of what is going to happen this hurricane season since the conditions are just right for a doozy of storm. The oil is going to go all over the gulf when that happens and whoever gets it (especially the right front quadrant) is gonna have a rough time cleaning up the areas affected by the storm surge.

As far as nuclear power plants... I think (but not sure so if I am wrong, please enlighten me) that Three Mile Island made people feel that the risk is not worth it. No one wants one in their backyards. In our pro-business until they screw up royally environment, I know I wouldn't. It would take one shortcut too many for something really bad to happen there.

 

[Colleen27]

As far as nuclear power plants... I think (but not sure so if I am wrong, please enlighten me) that Seven Mile Island made people feel that the risk is not worth it. No one wants one in their backyards. In our pro-business until they screw up royally environment, I know I wouldn't. It would take one shortcut too many for something really bad to happen there.

Yep. I don't think that was the initial concern over nuclear; I think after Chernobyl and Three Mile Island it was fear of a genuine accident or human error, but right now I think there's a serious trust issue that need be overcome for nuclear to enjoy any degree of public support. Too many cases across too many industries of deregulation leading to disaster have discredited the safety measures we are supposed to have in place. Can a government that would let this spill happen in the name of capitalism and the free market really be trusted to ensure nuclear safety?