Interesting news on the Gulf Oil disaster
From the
Wall Street Journal:
Big Spat on Rig Preceded Explosion
More details emerged Wednesday about a disagreement between employees of rig operator Transocean Ltd. and oil giant BP PLC over how to begin shutting down the well just hours before it exploded in the Gulf of Mexico last month.
Testimony on Wednesday about the disagreement, in a hearing held by the U.S. Coast Guard and the Minerals Management Service, which jointly regulate offshore drilling, was likely to bring increased scrutiny to the decisions BP made aboard the rig the day of the explosion, April 20.
There was also likely to be more focus on whether Transocean should have done more to ensure proper procedures were carried out.
Douglas H. Brown, Transocean's chief mechanic on the Deepwater Horizon rig, said key representatives from both companies had a "skirmish" during an 11 a.m. meeting on April 20. Less than 11 hours later, the well had a blowout, an uncontrolled release of oil and gas, killing 11 workers.
Mr. Brown said Transocean's crew leaders�including the rig operator's top manager, Jimmy W. Harrell�strongly objected to a decision by BP's top representative, or "company man," over how to start removing heavy drilling fluid and replacing it with lighter seawater from a riser pipe connected to the well head. Such pipes act as conduits between the rig and the wellhead at the ocean floor, and carry drilling fluid in and out of the well.
Probably be another six months at least until we know just what happened. I hope that Obama is not serious about shutting down all off-shore drilling. There are some incredible untapped deposits out there and we really need to be producing as much of our own oil as possible.
I love the blatant spin he is putting on this -- Obama was on it since Day One when this is absolute bullshit as his administration did not start to react until about nine days after the explosion. This well was on Federal land so it was the US Government's responsibility to initiate the procedures for containment and control.
Posted by DaveH at May 27, 2010 7:17 PM