Posted on 07/15/2013 1:25:26 PM PDT by thackney
Shell’s Olympus platform is finally embarking on its last epic voyage.
The Dutch company’s biggest and recently constructed tension leg platform started its final pre-production journey on Sunday, setting sail from the construction dock in Ingleside, Texas (near Corpus Christi) for a 425-mile voyage to the Mars B Field in the Gulf of Mexico.
For the next ten days, multiple tugboats will haul the 120,000 ton Olympus through the Aransas Pass jetties to its site destination 130 miles south of New Orleans.
Earlier this year, the hull made an 18,000-mile, two-month trek from South Korea to Ingleside.
The Olympus is Shell’s sixth and largest tension leg platform and will be used to process oil and gas from two of Shell’s deep water discoveries, West Boreas and South Deimos.
The Olympus TLP is expected to start production in 2014, producing at a rate of 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.
How much of this platform was actually built in the U.S.?
Just the architectural of this thing is a feat much less the construction. Incredible!
I want to know/see what’s below the surface of the water to hold
that monster so high above the water..........?????
What a sqeeker getting it through the pass!
What is the draft?
Most of the complicated stuff, the Topsides, was fabricated in Kiewit Offshore in Ingleside, Texas. They have a 400 acre fabrication yard.
http://www.kiewit.com/districts/kiewit-offshore-services/facility.aspx
Here is a link to a company that did x-ray inspection of the welding:
http://www.globalxray.com/global-x-ray-projects
The drilling structure was built in Houston's Lone-star Energy Fabrication.
http://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/A-rig-big-enough-for-Olympus-4295251.php
Drill, baby, DRILL !
The pontoons are somewhat visible when the hull was brought in, see the first picture in post #7.
They have big anchors within those giant pylons that are attached to the ocean floor. Or like the Ocean Ranger back in the 80’s, the pylons allow water in for balancing through computer systems.
Have a look:
http://images.mnn.com/sites/default/files/offshore_rigs.jpg
I should have stated the anchors are attached to 1,000’s of feet of heavy cable.
I don’t know. The Fab yard talks about having the ability to handle 45 draft depth, some that or less.
At the point in the picture, it is still floating. It will be anchored after it is moved out to the Mars Field.
I saw it from a distance of 10 to 30 miles while I was down at Corpus Christi over the 4th of July. It is quite impressive. I didn’t know it was already heading out in the Gulf.
Very impressive. I’m guessing the very large yellow crane was used to lift the drilling rig onto the platform. That’s some crane.
Must have a lot of ballast in the legs too.
I’ve fished around some although not as big
as this. Just amazing.
Wish we had some on all our coasts.
This is a tension leg platform. So it will use Anchors to pull down against the floating effect to limit movement once put in place.
At this early stage of movement, I suspect it is relatively light until they get to deeper water.
They will take 10 days to move the 425 miles to the oil field.
Sadly that can't happen under the current Obama cabal in charge. Offshore drilling has been halted and America's energy producers are saddled with ridiculous regulations that make drilling an unprofitable enterprise. Is is any wonder that fuel prices at the pump are stratospheric with the leftists running the government?
Correct.
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