Crews dealt setback in placing containment dome in Gulf oil spill

CNN ^ | 5/8/10 | Staff

[traderrob6]

Suttles said that another possible solution would be to "take ground-up material of various types and try to inject it into the blowout preventer at the bottom of it and it will flow up and plug it up," an operation he compared to stopping up a toilet.

The maneuver is called a "junk shot," Suttles said.

The blowout preventer is a 48-foot-tall, 450-ton apparatus that sits atop the well 5,000 feet underwater. It would stop the leak, BP has said, but it has not been working properly since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in flames on April 20 and sank two days later, triggering an oil spill that President Obama has called a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster."

[traderrob6]

Looks like the next long shot.

[antivenom]

However, if they can pump junk into the bop and down the casing, they might as well pump cement and kill.

[boycott]

Well they need to start doing something and something fast. People down here are freakin’ sick of this. This is going to get ugly if they don’t step up their game.

Where the hell is government? What are they doing? I know hussein obama said it was BP’s problem ......... I say bs. It may be a problem for BP but it’s our problem too. Where is the federal government? These azzclowns tell us they want a mission to Mars but don’t have the resources to better protect us from such a disaster?

EPA, currently under hussein obama, is out nickel & diming American businesses so that they’ll move their production overseas. All the Environmental PROTECTION Agency does is create an environment for lawyers to cash in. This liberal extremist arm of the federal government has failed us because better safeguards weren’t in place. Homeland Security has failed us too. If a terrorist had blown up one of these rigs, would we not have had a better response?

obama waited too late to start a burn. Almost 90% of the damage could have been prevented if he didn’t sit on his lazy ass when this first started.

I am sick of this and mad as can be. I am blaming a lot of this on BP but I am also blaming our FEDERAL government. We pay taxes to these clowns to protect us in such situations. We deserve better.

[traderrob6]

“However, if they can pump junk into the bop and down the casing, they might as well pump cement and kill.”

I’d like to believe it would be that simple but even with my limited knowledge on the subject, my intuition tells me it’s not.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Honest question - If the drill string is still connected to the BOP, as I understand it is, how will they sever it?

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Your questions and comments are good ones based on logic and the assumption that this administration is interested in the American people. However, the evidence does not lead to that assumption.

Press Secretary Gibbs early on said the problem was BP’s and that everyone should be suing them. If the government gets involved it might interfere with BP’s liability. They want BP to be totally responsible and the more damage the better.

Who do you think is more important to the Democrats - average Americans or lawyers who make their living suing at the drop of a hat and who give millions of dollars to the Democrats? What are they interested in, the environment or cash and power? The more the environment is damaged the better for them.

As Rahm Emanuel said, “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste. You can do things during a crisis you normally wouldn’t be able to do.”

We seem to always be in crisis with this administration.

This situation allows the Left to demonize Big Oil and big corporations at the same time. It allows them to push harsher environmental laws to accomplish their Leftist goals rather than out of any concern for the environment. It allows them to keep us oil dependent by curtailing our drilling while pushing pie-in-the-sky “green” solutions. The inevitable “unintended consequences” won’t be unintended at all.

This accident is wrought with possibilities for the Democrats/Leftists. Forget the logic we have been accustomed to, that of our President being concerned with our well being. Otherwise you will be constantly frustrated and confused.

When you acknowledge the facts before you, as counter intuitive as they may be, you will easily see that this administration wants our way of life and our country to be destroyed so they can rebuild their Communist Workers Paradise ion the rubble.

[boycott]

I tend to agree. The government is doing absolutely nothing to help with this crisis. They hardly even seem concerned.

obama is letting the sharks at sea die to let his sharks in suits win.

It really is pathetic when the US president basically says that an oil spill destroying our coast is BP problem.

[Kickass Conservative]

Makes you wonder what would be happening if an oil leak of this magnitude was a Natural Event instead of a Man Made Disaster.

The result is the same, but in a Natural Event there is nobody to blame, (Except President Bush of course), but a Man Made Disaster is ripe for Political Advantage, per Rahm Emanuel.

[antivenom]

The “riser” is connected to the sea floor BOPS, the drill pipe is inside the riser...

I suspect that the the length of riser sticking UP from the BOPs is probably equal to the length of drill pipe above the closed rams of BOPs and where the drill pipe ends is probably where the riser bends over to the ocean floor.

As for removing it...it can't take place until after they clog the well below the BOPS, or divert the flow to a relief well.

Pretty dicey stuff, and considering that hurricane season isn't that far off...could get real dicey.

One last resort could be to literally detonate a bomb at the well head, and hope it collapses in on itself...but there is no guarantee it will work.

[ArrogantBustard]

Where the hell is government?

Staying the hell out of the way. So far. As they should. Since when is "government" expert on anything to do with oil wells?

What are they doing?

Very little. As they should, since they basically know nothing.

[tacticalogic]

Could they force some kind of thermite grenades into it and weld it shut from the inside?

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Thanks.

Another thing I have been wondering about is how deep the drilling went after it began on the sea floor? Is the BOP the first thing installed before they start drilling? Had they in fact started and, if not, from where did the gas bubble come and from where does this oil come? That would indicate to me that they had started drilling and I wonder how deep it had gone?

We hear about the 5,000 ft below sea level but how much more are we talking about underground?

[antivenom]

18,000 feet deep from the GoM floor on down into the pay zones.

BOPs would be installed early on in the drilling process, when they are setting up the first casing. The well had been drilled to its maximum depth...they were setting up the interior with "walls" for a lack of a better description...so that the dirt, sand and debris wouldn't fall in on itself. They place casing and liners "basically pipe of differeing diameters". Imagine if you will...an old fashion telescope you all had as kids that collapsed in on it self...generally the type portrayed as what pirates use...a collapsing telescope.

OK...take your telescope and pull it all the way out and put the widest circumference to the top and the tapered end down

We will use that to explain...at every point where the circumference changes to allow the tube to slip into the next...is where the CEMENT would have been applied and a plug set (a capping method for the areas that were cemented)...so that gas from a smaller circumference tube wouldn't leak up into the next tube, except they THINK, that maybe the plug didn't set properly or the cement took on too much methane and it made the cement brittle, only an investigation into this may tell.

SO...this telescope of pipe is "casing" and "Liners".

Casings are larger diameter and nearer the BOPS, generally 2 but I have seen wells with more...and liners.

So by looking at this picture below you can see what I am trying to explain.

NOW they think the well was breached at one of the areas below the BOPS and allowed a rush of gas into the WELLBORE...now on the surface are mud engineers who calculate pressure and the diamter of the well and the distance to the top, on the rig and they PLAN on "how heavy" the mud needs to be to keep the gas down and allow the machinery to do its work...it is a fine science of keeping the mud light enough to work but heavy enough to keep the gas under control.

BOPS are open and shut in a manner where they BLEED off gas...however...if the well takes a KICK...a complete unexpected KICK of gas...that starts rising quickly and out of control to the surface it will expand at a great rate. it would push all the mud and water UP OUT of the riser all over the men and equipment all over the deck of the rig...and imagine that happening at 10 pm at night. NOW remember BOPS are "not smart" generally the operate on command, the command would be a human pushes and pulls a lever from open to close and back. NOW...if that scenario is true and the rig was backing out or snubbing pipe...and drillpipe was in the riser and the scenario played out...it is possible that pipe blew out...or worse FELL down the riser...and when the BOPS on the GoM floor were told to close...they didn't close shut...they closed around the drillpipe...and the drill pipe is hollow...so the flow from the well wouldn't cease...just slow down.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Great explanation, thanks. I know enough to think I know more than I do.

[dfwgator]

Let’s face it, if this were Bush, the MSM would have this story on 24/7 and be crucifying him.

[boycott]

Where the hell is government?
Staying the hell out of the way. So far. As they should. Since when is “government” expert on anything to do with oil wells?

What are they doing?

Very little. As they should, since they basically know nothing.

---

BP certainly doesn’t seem to have a clue.

I don’t care if it’s NASA, the Navy, other oil companies, or whomever. Anyone that can help needs to be helping.

I live along the coast and I am sick of this bs. They’re going to destroy my homeland for what will likely be the rest of my life. BP isn’t getting it done. They should be willing to accept the help of anyone willing to help.

I don’t really give a flip about the legal issues right now. I want this leak stopped now.

[mad_as_he$$]

The BOP is not 450 tons.

[mad_as_he$$]

A junk shot is partly fast acting cement.

[mad_as_he$$]

Cable saw. Very effective. It is how they cut the bow off the Kursk.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Thanks.