Deepwater Horizon - Transocean Oil Rig Fire

Offshore
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[QUOTE=Infomania;48874]Replying to New Orleans Lady’s excellent posts:

THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH FOR ALL THE WORK YOU PUT INTO THE POSTING the eleven tributes and additional videos and links on the one year anniversary.

You are such a kind spirit and are truly sentimental about the workers and their families.

I think it’s ironic that it took a registered nurse to post tributes to the eleven who were taken that day.

I guess the oil field hands are absorbed in trying to understand exactly what happened. We forgot the most important element here, the human tragedy, the injuries, the loss to the eleven families and their communities.[/QUOTE]

Yes. Infomania, she does have a heart of Gold.

I prayed for Adam and the other good people in my own way.

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[QUOTE=alcor;48945]The telegraph reports:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/8470367/US-Coast-Guard-report-supports-BP-legal-action-on-Gulf-of-Mexico-disaster.html[/QUOTE]

The wider question is… “if bp were so unhappy or concerned with the companies and people they were employing for their work, why did they not STOP and shut them down?”

Those that pay the Piper can call the tune! Complacency by bp is another and bigger issue.

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you hit the nail right on the head Alf. In fact BP used the exact same contractors on the relief wells and are probably currently still using them on wells around the world.

I found it funny when someone from BP testified that they had been dissatisfied with Halliburton’s in house engineer Gagliano for the past ten years.

TEN YEARS!! Are you kidding me?
The oil patch I worked in was more likely to call a service company’s home office in TEN MINUTES and request a replacement for an operator or engineer who “wasn’t going with the flow” or having problems completing or comprehending a job assignment. If the situation could not be resolved the service company was “run off the job”.

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Wow, no wonder I’m nervous Oil prices plunged, finishing the week at $97.18 per barrel, down $16.76, in the biggest weekly dollar loss since oil began trading on the Nymex in 1983.

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[QUOTE=Infomania;49345]Wow, no wonder I’m nervous Oil prices plunged, finishing the week at $97.18 per barrel, down $16.76, in the biggest weekly dollar loss since oil began trading on the Nymex in 1983.[/QUOTE]

You should be nervous, but maybe not for the reason you may think. This was a “flash crash” caused by automated trading programs executing stop-loss orders. What happens is a bunch of speculators set automatic sell limits at various prices. There are so many of these people that you may have thousands of latent sell orders sitting out there at varying prices. Speculators use these things because they don’t have the capital to cover temporary losses (as opposed to the people who buy and sell oil contracts because they are actually in the oil business). So let’s say oil’s at 105 and there’s a couple of thousand automated orders to sell at 103. Normal fluctuation drops it to 103, which triggers a bit wave of selling, which drops it to 101, which triggers the latent stop-loss orders that were at 102, which drops it to 100 … you get the idea.

This is what happens when you convert what used to be more or less reasonable contracts markets into casinos patronized by robots. Nobody, but nobody, understands how these things will behave in even mildly abnormal circumstances.

Cheers,

Earl

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I totally agree with your assessment Mr. Earl. I only “watch oil and natural gas prices” as these are critical to the local economy here.

However, the same haphazard automated trading in the stock market is starting to give me a bit of anxiety. I may be getting too old to play these unpredictable games.

Glad you commented, I value your opinion.

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[QUOTE=Infomania;49340]_____________
you hit the nail right on the head Alf. In fact BP used the exact same contractors on the relief wells and are probably currently still using them on wells around the world.

I found it funny when someone from BP testified that they had been dissatisfied with Halliburton’s in house engineer Gagliano for the past ten years.

TEN YEARS!! Are you kidding me?
The oil patch I worked in was more likely to call a service company’s home office in TEN MINUTES and request a replacement for an operator or engineer who “wasn’t going with the flow” or having problems completing or comprehending a job assignment. If the situation could not be resolved the service company was “run off the job”.[/QUOTE]

Here is something else which strikes me as odd…!?
99.9999999% of those involved with those events on the Horizon last year have either testified or have been quoted otherwise.

Yet, 2 persons that were highly (and actively) involved seem to have disappeared off the face of the Earth.

Where are Mr Vidrine and Mr Kaluza?

Are they both so inept and un-professional individuals that they don’t give a damn about what happened a year ago?

I have my own opinions of them, as I’m sure most others have. “It begins with them being 'Good 'ol Boys sitting back and waiting out their pension payments”

Here’s an analogy that’s very common in the Far East… when someone with any type of authority (from lowly to high) get’s caught doing things ‘wrongly’ they usually feign a sudden medical illness to avoid being hand-cuffed and brought to justice… and on it goes…!!!

I haven’t seen even 1 picture of these two individuals… but they could be somewhere on the internet.

Anyone at least know what they look like?

Why aren’t the tigers of the American press hounding them?

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[QUOTE=Alf;49408] Where are Mr Vidrine and Mr Kaluza?
[/QUOTE]

Keeping a very low profile somewhere in Bophal, India.

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I m still trying to find out who came up with the bright idea on land from BP to change the well plan sequence, re the cement plug on april 16 2010 from the original plan on april 14, 2010. Everybody is tip toeing around this. WHo,I want to know Who!!!.. Anyways,I found this article for ya , ALF. Also, thanks for acknowledging the “tribute” for our guys…Its all about them,not me.
[B]Documents Fill In Gaps in Narrative on Oil Rig Blast[/B]

[B]By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.[/B]

[B]Published: September 7, 2010[/B]

[ul]
[li]Print[/li][/ul]
[ul]
[li]http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/08/us/08rig.html?pagewanted=all#[/li][/ul]LAFAYETTE, La. — In a quiet suburb of this oil town, there is a spacious brick house with all of the shades drawn. Inside is a graying and pale man who knows as much as anyone about what happened on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig the day it exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. He is not talking.

Enlarge This Image

[B]Alex Wong/Getty Images[/B]

A ribbon in remembrance of the 11 men who died in the rig blast.

[B]Related[/B]

[ul]
[li][B]Times Topic: Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill (2010)[/B][/li][/ul]Enlarge This Image

[B]Stacy Kranitz for The New York Times[/B]

The Louisiana home of Donald J. Vidrine, the BP manager who has refused, citing ill health, to appear before panels investigating the oil rig explosion, though his name has come up frequently.

Enlarge This Image

[B]Gerald Herbert/Associated Press[/B]

Mark Hafle, a BP engineer in Houston, testified before a Coast Guard panel in May. Mr. Vidrine is said to have consulted with Mr. Hafle on the night of the explosion.

Enlarge This Image

[B]Alex Wong/Getty Images[/B]

At a news conference in June, Shelly Anderson, whose husband, Jason, died in the blast.

“No comment, no comment,” says Donald J. Vidrine, who was one of two “company men,” or well-site leaders for BP, when a surge of gas caused a blowout and fire on April 20, killing 11 men and starting one of the largest oil spills in United States history.
Mr. Vidrine, who was the most experienced and highest-ranking BP manager on the floating oil rig, has been mentioned frequently during hearings into the disaster, along with the name of the other, less-experienced well-site leader, Robert Kaluza.
Together the two men oversaw critical tests in the two days leading up to the explosion, and Mr. Vidrine, who is 62, overcame his apparent doubts about the well’s integrity and made a momentous decision that led to the accident, according to the testimony of others. He gave the order to replace heavy drilling mud in the riser pipe, which leads from the rig to the well’s head, with lighter seawater, a necessary step before capping the well.
That decision made it impossible for the drilling crew to control a surge of natural gas from deep within the well, leading to the blowout. The rig burned and then sank two days later. More details about the events may come to light Wednesday, with the release of BP’s internal investigation into the disaster.
Mr. Vidrine has refused three times to appear at hearings into the disaster held by the Coast Guard and federal regulators, saying he is in ill health.
Mr. Kaluza, 60, who had been on the rig for only a few days, has also declined to appear, citing his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. Both face possible federal criminal charges.
In hearings, witnesses from BP and the various subcontractors involved in the project have painted a picture of Mr. Vidrine as the pivotal figure in the drama preceding the disaster.
The roles of Mr. Vidrine and other managers on the rig are also being scrutinized as the companies involved in the disaster argue over liability.
Worried about an unexplained high-pressure reading in the drill pipe, Mr. Vidrine insisted on a second pressure test to make sure there was not an explosive bubble of gas building up in the well, even though senior members of the drilling team for Transocean, the Swiss company that owns and operated the rig, thought another test was unnecessary, according to the testimony of managers and workers on the rig.
In addition, notes from an interview he gave to BP officials investigating the blowout, obtained by The New York Times, show Mr. Vidrine raised concerns about the possibility of a surge of gas, or a kick, with a superior in Houston before going ahead and replacing the mud in the riser pipe with seawater.
Mr. Vidrine said the superior, Mark Hafle, an engineer, responded, “If there had been a kick in the well, we would have seen it.”
In the end, however, Mr. Vidrine made the call that it was safe to proceed, according to the notes and the testimony of several witnesses. He accepted the explanation provided by members of Transocean’s drill team that the high pressure reading in the drill pipe, of about 1,400 pounds per square inch, was no cause for alarm.
These drillers — chief among them the night-shift toolpusher, Jason Anderson, who died in the ensuing fire — insisted they had seen a similar phenomenon before, calling it “annular compression.”
Engineers say they were referring to cases in which the downward pressure from the heavy drilling fluid, known as mud, between the drill pipe and the walls of the well surrounding it pushes the seawater back up the drill pipe, an effect also known in the oil business as “U-tubing.”
Mr. Vidrine, who has 30 years’ experience working on oil rigs both at sea and on land, told lawyers from BP that he had heard about annular compression “but had not seen it before.”
“The toolpusher and the senior toolpusher told me it was this annular compression thing,” he said, according to the notes, dated April 27. “I wanted to do another test.”
Other witnesses, testifying at the Coast Guard hearing, described Mr. Vidrine as wary when he came on duty on the drill floor that day at 6 p.m. to relieve Mr. Kaluza.
It had been an unusually busy day for the two men because not only were they were preparing to seal the well, but four high-level executives from BP and Transocean had also visited the rig for a tour. Mr. Vidrine had skipped sleep and started work early to help shepherd the V.I.P.’s around the rig.
During the day, Mr. Kaluza and Transocean’s top manager on the rig, Jimmy W. Harrell, had overseen a “negative pressure test” to see if gas was leaking into the well, through its cement-and-pipe-lined walls or around a series of cement plugs.
The test involved replacing the heavy drilling fluid in the drill pipe with seawater down to 8,300 feet to see if the well would start to flow, an indication the well’s walls or plugs might be allowing gas and oil from deep underground to leak in.
Not only did the well flow, Mr. Harrell testified, but the drillers lost at least 23 barrels of drilling fluid during the test. Some drilling experts said that suggested that the well’s concrete casing and plugs were not entirely sound.
“They shouldn’t be losing any mud at all,” said Greg McCormack, an engineer with the Petroleum Extension Service at the University of Texas. “That is an indication that something is wrong somewhere.”
Yet Mr. Harrell testified to the marine board that he still believed the test had gone well. He said that some drilling mud was always lost during such tests, and that the amount lost was too small to signal a leaking well.
“It had a good test the first time, but they wanted to do it again once the company man come on — Don Vidrine,” Mr. Harrell testified on May 27.
Senior members of the drilling crew agreed with Mr. Harrell and theorized that the pressure in the drill pipe was caused not by a surge of gas deep in the well, but by the U-tubing phenomenon.
Others on the rig were skeptical. Wyman Wheeler, who was the day-shift toolpusher, argued with Mr. Kaluza and others about the pressure and then walked off the drill floor in a huff.
“Bob Kaluza and them was saying it was U-tubing and Wyman was convinced that something wasn’t right,” recalled a witness, Christopher Pleasant, the subsea engineer.
Mr. Kaluza, who had little experience in offshore drilling, also seemed doubtful, witnesses said. He called a stop to all work until Mr. Vidrine came on duty at 6 p.m.
When Mr. Vidrine arrived, he grilled Mr. Kaluza about the first test for about an hour, Mr. Pleasant recalled.
Mr. Vidrine told BP officials that some members of the Transocean team found his questioning of Mr. Kaluza and his worries about drill-pipe pressure odd. “They found it kind of humorous that I talked about it for a long time,” he said, according to the notes.
Still, Mr. Vidrine insisted on a second test that would be done slightly differently, measuring the upward flow in a smaller line running from the wellhead to the rig known as the “kill line.”
According to the notes, Mr. Vidrine’s theory was that if the pressure in the drill pipe was evidence of a surge of gas deep in the well they would see similar pressure in the kill line.
The precise results of the second test remain an open question. No paper record survived, and neither Mr. Vidrine nor Mr. Kaluza has testified. Mr. Harrell said he left the drilling floor and was told by Mr. Vidrine later “they had a good negative test for 30 minutes.” Other witnesses have reported that Mr. Vidrine told them the same thing.
In his comments to BP, Mr. Vidrine said the second test dispelled his doubts. “There was no indication the gas was coming up,” he said, according to the notes, which are not verbatim.
A short while later, Mr. Vidrine gave the order to start displacing all the drilling mud in both the riser pipe and the drill pipe with seawater, one of the final steps before capping the well and moving the rig to a new spot. He left the rig floor to go to his office and do some paperwork.
Ten minutes later, Mr. Anderson, the night-shift toolpusher, called Mr. Vidrine in a panic and said the drilling mud had begun to spew out of the well, according to the notes. This was around 9:30 p.m., according to witnesses.
“I grabbed my hat and started for the floor,” Mr. Vidrine told BP officials, according to the notes. “It must have taken around 30 seconds to get outside. I went through the short hall and upstairs. There was mud and seawater blowing everywhere.”
“There was then an explosion, a blast,” the notes said.

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From New Orleans Lady’s article:

Mr. Kaluza, who had little experience in offshore drilling, also seemed doubtful, witnesses said. He called a stop to all work until Mr. Vidrine came on duty at 6 p.m.
When Mr. Vidrine arrived, he grilled Mr. Kaluza about the first test for about an hour, Mr. Pleasant recalled.
[B][U]Mr. Vidrine told BP officials that some members of the Transocean team found his questioning of Mr. Kaluza and his worries about drill-pipe pressure odd. They found it kind of humorous that I talked about it for a long time,he said, according to the notes. [/U][/B]
Still, Mr. Vidrine insisted on a second test that would be done slightly differently, measuring the upward flow in a smaller line running from the wellhead to the rig known as the kill line.
According to the notes, Mr. Vidrine’s theory was that if the pressure in the drill pipe was evidence of a surge of gas deep in the well they would see similar pressure in the kill line.

In addition, notes from an interview he gave to BP officials investigating the blowout, obtained by The New York Times, show Mr. Vidrine raised concerns about the possibility of a surge of gas, or a kick, with a superior in Houston before going ahead and replacing the mud in the riser pipe with seawater.
Mr. Vidrine said the superior,[B][U] Mark Hafle, an engineer, responded, “If there had been a kick in the well, we would have seen it.” [/U][/B]

Don Vidrine and Wyman were suspicious that something was wrong. Basically almost all others disagreed with him. Eventually he capitulated. He was out numbered both on the rig and from the bank.

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The Justice Department better come up with something better, than the following article exemplifies, because, if not, the public is going to be P’d off !! Come on John Buretta , this is your chance to make a difference!!!
DOJ Quietly Overhauls BP Oil Spill Probe
[B]Environmental Law http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/doj_quietly_overhauls_bp_oil_spill_probe/[/B]

[B]DOJ Quietly Overhauls BP Oil Spill Probe[/B]

Posted Mar 25, 2011 3:00 PM CDT
By Molly McDonough

As the anniversary of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico approaches, Justice Department officials have only recently created a special task force to oversee a probe examining who may be criminally responsible.
NPR reports the DOJ “quietly overhauled their approach” earlier this month and put a veteran mob prosecutor in charge of its New Orleans-based task force.
Deputy Attorney General Jim Cole told NPR that he launched the task force to streamline efforts to determine if any laws were broken leading up to the April oil rig explosion that killed 11 and led to the months-long spill.
“I think the coordination and bringing it all into one single task force is going to speed up the resolution to this case rather than slow it down,” Cole said.
Leading the special task force is John Buretta, a federal prosecutor from Brooklyn, N.Y., who is experienced prosecuting mob figures and terrorists. NPR noted that Buretta also has managed cases involving complex fraud.
NPR reported that in addition to environmental violations, there are three likely legal theories being explored by prosecutors:
• Whether BP intentionally played down the size of the spill to investors and regulators.
• Whether executives dumped stock after the spill but before the public knew the extent of the leak.
• Whether there was any document destruction that could trigger obstruction charges.

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[B]Related Topics[/B]

Attorney General, Criminal Justice, Energy Law, Environmental Law, Oil Spill, Trials & Litigation

[B]Comments[/B]

2

  1. Truth Seeker
    Mar 27, 2011 1:06 PM CDT
    How come neither the media, nor any attorneys, have so far inquired as to what happened to the database of mitigation ideas that, supposedly, had between 15,000-30,000 formal entries in it (many from scientists and engineers and other experts)? Seems like that would be a good thing to explore with regards to the question of competency, possible cover-up, and possible earlier mitigation opportunities that could have drastically reduced the eventual damages that resulted from this unprecedented disaster. As I understand it, if you have a leak in your roof, created by some accident, you are still expected, by your insurance company, to take all necessary actions to prevent further damages. How is this different with regards to BP’s disaster and “supposed” accident? I know they were self-insured, but there is still the question of competency, due diligence, negligence, and perhaps willful disregard for potentially viable remedies, that could have been applied much sooner .
    Case in point (one of perhaps a dozen, or more):
    http://www.npr.org/2011/03/05/134268980/could-cornstarch-have-plugged-bps-oil-well
    Just some of the important questions that I think need to be asked as we approach the one year anniversary of this catastrophe:
  1. If the leak could have been slowed or stopped 4-8 weeks sooner, how much would that have reduced the costs and damages of this disaster?
  2. If the oil could have been cleaned more effectively during the first 60 days, how much environmental damage and loses could have been prevented?
  3. Don’t we need to be able to inspect that (now apparently proprietary) database of ideas (contributed by the public), in order to find answers to some of these questions?
  4. Why all the secrecy surrounding what was being proposed at the time? Why has that database, now, apparently, just been “deep-sixed”?
  5. Not even one of the ideas proposed for stopping future oil leaks has ever been acknowledged by anyone, how come?
  6. Is there some kind of a cover-up of this information now going on?
  7. Should the media and the various attorneys representing aggrieved parties have access to all such information (including proposals made directed to the Coast Guard, the President and perhaps members of Congress)?
  8. Is anyone at BP, or in the government, even interested in pursuing ANY of these potentially viable proposals, or are we going to wait for the next disaster to occur, before we have a look at that database again?
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John Buretta, has an interesting background, which, makes me feel, he is the perfect man for the Job, of getting these BP Bad Boys , Jailed!!!
3 |
4 |
[U]http://www.federallawenforcementfoundation.com/ioty10.html[/U]5 |
6 |

[B]John Buretta[/B]

[B]Assistant United States Attorney, Eastern District of New York [/B]

John Buretta Assistant United States Attorney, Eastern District of New York Assistant U.S. Attorney John Buretta is recognized for his outstanding prosecution and trial achievements. During his six years in the Office, John has had a consistent track record of successfully prosecuting complex cases against serious offenders: high-ranking members of La Cosa Nostra, national security violators, and violent gang members. During the past year, John led trial teams that convicted the leaders of two different Cosa Nostra crime families for racketeering murders carrying life sentences: Vincent Basciano, the acting boss of the Bonanno organized crime family, and Alphonse Persico, the acting boss of the Colombo organized crime family. John’s leadership as Deputy Chief and then as Chief of the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section in the Eastern District of New York, together with the tremendous efforts of the many fine Assistant U.S. Attorneys, support staff, and law enforcement partners with whom he works, has also resulted in the recent indictment or conviction of various other leaders of the Bonanno and Colombo crime families, as well as the hierarchy of the Gambino crime family, and several dozen additional Cosa Nostra members and associates. These cases include charging more than fifteen murders carried out by Cosa Nostra during the past thirty years. Most recently in this arena, John has led the prosecution of three Genovese associates charged in August of this year for their roles in the ambush-robbery and murder of Staten Island jeweler Louis Antonelli - charges that were brought within three months after Mr. Antonelli was shot and killed. Beyond his hallmark organized crime prosecutions, John has devoted significant time to national security investigations and to prosecution of violent gang members. Emblematic of John’s several national security matters was his prosecution this past year of a U.S. Army translator for violation of the Espionage Act. The translator, who was embedded with the 82nd Airborne in Iraq, received a lengthy prison sentence for stealing highly sensitive, classified U.S. Army intelligence concerning Al Qaeda and other insurgent forces in Iraq. In the area of gang prosecutions, John has brought numerous high impact cases. In 2005, for example, John led the investigative team that indicted the leadership and several members of the extremely violent Folk Nation gang in Brooklyn on racketeering charges for ten murders and attempted murders, including the tragic drive-by murder of an innocent restaurant manager. Those indictments followed John’s prosecution of over thirty-five other violent drug offenders in the Marcus Garvey Village housing complex in Brooklyn - a case that resulted in a precipitous drop in gang violence in that neighborhood from numerous homicides and scores of shootings the prior year to no homicides or shootings in the year after the arrests.

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[B]A Year After Start of BP Deepwater Horizon Disaster, DOJ Sits on Its Thumbs[/B]

By: bmaz Friday April 22, 2011 5:59 am

A year after Macondo the Mouth of Hell roared in the Gulf of Mexico, forever altering the ecology and lives of those who depend on the Gulf for their existence, it is business as usual for BP and a complicit Department of Justice http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2011/04/22/doj-sits-on-its-thumbs/
What could have been done to address these heinous human and ecological wrongs that has not?
Everything.
Because nothing, not diddly squat, has been done. And if the corporate powers that be in this country, and the political puppets who serve them, including Barack Obama, Eric Holder and the currently politicized Department of Justice, have anything to say about it (and they have [I]everything[/I] to say about it) nothing significant is going to be done about BP, TransOcean, Halliburton and the Gulf tragedy, or anything related, in the future.
Like the craven and dishonest shell game that has been played by the current administration with regard to torture and destruction of evidence, the US government appears to simply be determined to shine this on with the bare minimum of faux accountability and disingenuous rhetoric to soothe the perturbed masses and maintain status quo with their partners in corporate/political domination of the American populous. That is clearly who they are, and quite apparently who we have become.
So, what could have been the process? Well, that is pretty easily delineated. In fact, I set it out definitively on May 28th of last year. Please refer to the link to the post for a complete list of the factors, nee elements of the crimes, that were already present a year ago. It is startling to realize what was already known then; especially when compounded with what is known now. The only difference today is that we can definitively add the United States government, and the administration of Barack Obama, to the queue of “Criminals in the Gulf“.
The bottom line is it is a safe bet John Buretta, the rackets specialist, has been assigned to wrap up a nice tidy little package involving simple negligence across the board. It minimizes the spill penalties to BP and will allow criminal charges, if there are any individuals charged at all, to be restricted to a couple of sacrificial lambs who were calling the shots on the Deepwater Horizon rig. If I were Robert Kaluza and Donald Vidrine, the BP company men in charge of Deepwater Horizon when it blew, I would be more than a little worried about the direction this is going, because they are the obvious lambs being prepared for slaughter.
But BP itself, on the other hand, looks set up to be escorted through the process by the Administration and DOJ mostly unscathed. That is what the government does for its valued corporate partners. In fact, far from being penalized and/or debarred from federal contracting as it should be, as Jason Leopold reported Wednesday, BP is being given sweetheart no-bid contracts by the Administration.
Maybe a rackets prosecutor is the right guy after all, because this is quite a racket being run between the US government and BP. A year after Macondo the Mouth of Hell roared, and it is business as usual. Who could have predicted? <<<<The previous is just a portion of an excellant article,please read it in its entirety. Thanks NoLa>>>>

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Commenting on the NPR story that New Orleans lady posted.

Jeez, it’s been almost thirteen months since the blowout. The DOJ performance in this investigation appears to be as deficient as the organizations being investigated. There are hundreds of pages of reports from different commissions and yet the DOJ has not formally charged any person or corporation.

FILE THE CHARGES!!!
Issue subpoenas for depositions. Get sworn statements on the record before some of these older witnesses and “persons of interest” pass away. Who knows, with proper legal protections in place they may actually answer some of the questions posed in deposition. If they want to “take the fifth” on each individual question then that’s their right, but, for God’s sake, can’t the government get off their collective asses and record an official legal record for this incident.

Additionally, are Government prosecutors protecting MMS personnel? Oddly, it seems as though rubber stamping drilling plans is not negligence.

Let’s charge ALL THE PLAYERS involved, gather the evidence and present the cases to a jury (or juries). I believe the Environmental case should be tried separately from the cases involving bodily injury and wrongful death.

I am willing to accept those verdicts after proper appeals etc. as the final disposition for this immensely complicated case. It’s time to get on the road to closure for this incident. The DOJ and the Federal court system should lead the way to a speedy trial for all involved.

There, I am off my soap box!!

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[QUOTE=New Orleans Lady;49459]I m still trying to find out who came up with the bright idea on land from BP to change the well plan sequence, re the cement plug on april 16 2010 from the original plan on april 14, 2010. Everybody is tip toeing around this. WHo,I want to know Who!!!..
[/QUOTE]

A decision like this would would have been initiated by some engineer (Hafle?) and then be approved at least by John Guide and most likely also by the Drilling Operations Manager (I forget his name just now)

[QUOTE=New Orleans Lady;49459]Anyways,I found this article for ya , ALF.

…they had seen a similar phenomenon before, calling it “annular compression.” … an effect also known in the oil business as “U-tubing.”

Mr. Vidrine, who has 30 years’ experience working on oil rigs both at sea and on land, told lawyers from BP that he had heard about annular compression “but had not seen it before.” [/QUOTE]

If the above is correct then it raises some serious questions as to Vidrine’s competence.

U-tubing is common in the drilling industry particularly when more than 1 different (density) fluid is being used. It’s basic physics!

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Fluid volumes are an excellent starting point for me to pursue (my personal fix!). Remember, casing was set and the cement job was apparently completed. But, we have no analysis on volume control during the cement being pumped. Were there losses during the pumping procedure? Yes or no? Suggestions have been made that full returns were recorded, but it hasn’t been validated by scrutinising the Logger’s data. At least, I haven’t seen any indication of fact, just unsubstantiated claims that all went well.
So, was volume tracked while pumping cement and displacing it? And why is this important? Because, we need to isolate all of the hydrocarbon zone. So, do we have records indicating full returns? No-one has bothered to check, I suspect. Or, volumes are not in order, in which case, the shit hits the fan once more and we need to find out who is responsible for volumes and reporting back the facts.
It may well be that the cement job went according to plan but no-one has actually questioned whether or not volumes were consistent.

The other point worthy of comment is the new phrase that’s come into the arena “Annular Compression”. The actual term in use during the investigation was “Bladder Affect”, and we all have come to realise that this term does not exist. Why has the meaning changed to “Annular Compression”? And everyone in the oil industry knows about the U-Tube effect. Everyone. It appears that they on the DF also understood that ‘0’ on one gauge and ‘1400’ on another represented U-tube effect, at least that’s what’s being advanced! And yet, they were prepared to accept the test…as an inflow test of the well’s barriers. The decision makers on the DF must have been confused. It’s impossible to pass a test which shows 1400 psi. This simply leads all to recognise that basic principles of physics were either being ignored or not understood…Or, they were prepared to gamble.

Vidrine knows all about U Tubing. And so did the crew on the vessel. You don’t get to the position of Driller or Toolpusher without this understanding and knowledge. So, they all thought the 1400 psi was coming exclusively from the U Tube effect. Ok, they’ve simply demonstrated that Heavy Pill is most likely in the Annulus below the BOP. They haven’t proved the integrity of the well. Will it flow? Who knows? Hasn’t it already flowed? They bled off volumes much greater than required and did they check if the same volume was required to fill the Annulus due to this U-Tube effect? I’ve heard no evidence of this.

So, they get the all-clear to carry on!!! And they do exactly that without any consideration for volumes from the well. I’m afraid there’s some serious basic principles of well control and observation being overlooked. The truth is that the culture of safety and well monitoring is being completely ignored, and it doesn’t matter how we try to pin this on an engineer onshore because it just won’t stick. The guys on the DF made decisions for themselves on the well’s integrity. They failed to recognise that nothing had been tested except for the apparent U-Tube effect. None of the barriers were tested! Correction, the barriers were tested and failed, but were blamed on the U-Tube. Even when it was presumed to be the U Tube someone should have advanced the fact that the barriers had not been tested.

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This article is worthy of a second reading. We’re looking for the guilty and this addresses some of the questions at the heart of who may be responsible.

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In addition, this may raise further questions:

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The last paragraph of the above article is the most likely outcome of the legal proceedings filed by the main players.
Expect to see a lot of behind the scenes negotiations with stipulations will seal the final settlements.

“Legal experts believe the parties are likely to settle with each other out of court to stop more damaging details about the accident battering their images in the public domain.”

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I keep reading bullshit about London based BP and how this has an effect on the outcome of the Horizon. The truth is that BP is simply quoted on the London Stock Exchange and has over 40% share representation in the US. Moreover, all planning and execution of this well was American, all parties involved and all decision making was authorised in the US, and even by the MMS, the governing body overseeing the development and production of hydrocarbons on the US continental shelf.
If five people get together in a doghouse and finally agree that the well’s barriers have been proven intact then it says more about accountability of the authorities that this is allowed to happen. This is a failure of Government. Sue them! They have deemed this culture to be acceptable. That’s why we have 5 people in a doghouse, unsure of the integrity test, and nervous about looking foolish! Perhaps!!! Maybe!! One thing is for sure, other nations require documental evidence of integrity onshore and the only people who give the OK to move on are the Authorities. But, for some reason, the US Authorities didn’t have a system in place to give endorsement or the go-ahead for operations. That’s why the public are clamouring for BP, because Obama decided fault lay with them solely, in accordance with rights to drill offshore.
The fact still remains that 5 people interpreted the results in the doghouse. All 5 were wrong. These are the leading personnel on a vessel worth more than $700 million in todays money!

Naturally, a mistake was made. And it should have been recognised as soon as 20-30 Bbls of hydrocarbons entered the well. This is the greatest failure of all, the fact that the vessel’s crew did not observe volumes throughout the displacement. Some suggest this is a difficult task. Baloney! It must always be done. Otherwise we’re ‘gambling’ again and the stakes are getting higher and higher…we’re blindly compromising the safety of the crew.

The well is blowing! The BOP is functioned. It fails. The world turns upside down! 11 men are lost needlessly. And where are we today? Deliberating over who needs to pay who for apparent losses! How far are the payments supposed to go? It’s absolutely ridiculous to think that everyone living around the GOM gets some sort of recompense from BP alone. Remember, BP requested the rights to explore for resources with an element of risk. The Government can’t absolve themselves of ‘interest’ when they were going to make a very healthy profit from the enterprise. It seems inconceivable that when BP needed government resources to minimise the scale of the accident they were met with Obama’s ‘boot to their throats’, charming ‘NOT’! But, I have a suspicion that the delay to kill the well may have some government responsibility, in that, they may have refused to endorse the Top Kill at an earlier time (remember, all thought the well had failed in the Annulus side), my personal take on things which shouldn’t be ignored. After all, the government haven’t been as hard on BP as they initially were. I assume they realise that Transocean have the capability at any time to intervene in a well when volumes become anomalous and if required to close the BOP.

Why do all rigs have a BOP? To shut in a well and prevent a blowout. Transocean have serious questions to answer. They have full responsibility of volume observation and control…and full responsibility for well control practices.

Will the parties settle out of court? It depends on whether any single party has to shoulder all or a larger share of the financial burden. Remember, no-one wins and all lose. But all can lose at an acceptable financial cost. Money governs everything! Those with principles will have to accept that no single person from any company purposely intended to cause the Horizon accident, but many have been negligent including the governmental authorities.

So, who pays all those making claims? Who is guilty? I’d imagine the tax-payer will meet some of the costs. Unwittingly, we all share the burden and risk of exploration. Therefore, the cost too!

Who should be taken care of immediately? Everyone has a position or opinion on this… until we find our own wallets may be affected…by someone else’s mistake!! How can we all be pacified? It’s impossible. But, let’s be sure of one thing…money is at the top of everyone’s mind! A sad reflection on society!