Nine Important Points about the BP Blowout Part 1

Oil Price.com ^ | Tuesday, 15 June 2010 | Allen Gilmer

[Comrade Brother Abu Bubba]

Request HELP to link on this page a Well Schematic (BELOW) on Mississippi Canyon 252 (HTML challenged) which would be beneficial to the reader's visualization (subsea bed) of the 9 casing strings in the formation.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_udSTgadqhFc/S-uAQp9p7jI/AAAAAAAABbg/hQCGgca2Se8/s1600/Deepwater+well+casing.jpg

[newfreep]

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_udSTgadqhFc/S-uAQp9p7jI/AAAAAAAABbg/hQCGgca2Se8/s1600/Deepwater+well+casing.jpg

[Constitution Day]

[equalitybeforethelaw]

Not having a Nobel Prize, could someone direct me to a site that fully describes and illustrates the structure and processes required for deep watr drilling. All this “inside baseball” lingo concerning proper and improper pratices needs an accepted model of behavior to contrast to. Not being a oil guy, these posts are interesting but ultimately useless since we laymen have no way to digest and screen the comments for accuracy and common sense.

[mad_as_he$$]

Link to original article seems broken.

[Moose4]

OK, some of this is over my head, but the picture helps (thanks CD for putting it in-line!).

What is a “lock ring” and why would it be a bad thing not to have one? And the author seems to be saying that they did wrong by using cement with nitrogen mixed in, and using a 16” diameter pipe for too much length?

}:-)4

[Mr. Jazzy]

ping for later

[Star Traveler]

9 Important Points about the BP Blowout – Part 1

[central_va]

It’s obvious that the hydraulic well head oscillator should have been engaged prior to pumping sea water in the diverter housing. /sarc

[RedCell]

It’s obvious that the hydraulic well head oscillator should have been engaged prior to pumping sea water in the diverter housing. /sarc

What you're saying is that the flux capacitor blew at the most inopportune time.

[Paladin2]

I think the BOP should have prevented a blowout.

[central_va]

What you're saying is that the flux capacitor blew at the most inopportune time.

Exactly! That is what caused the inertial pressure regulator to fail in the first place!

[central_va]

The BOP didn’t.

[dblshot]

One wonders why the rush? I assume that project management has a bonus incentive to finish and being 26 mm over AFE already was about to lose any remaing bonus money. So the incentive was to finish quickly.

[henkster]

I think it says they were running a low-power test and deactivated a number of control safeguards and then tried to power up far too quickly...oh wait...wrong disaster. My bad.

[fujimoh]

This entire ordeal will be blamed on earthquakes and be classified as a natural disaster.

[dblshot]

BOP may not have been able to handle the massive surge of gas pressure as the mud was removed too quickly and no one was monitoring the pit level since the mud was going straight to an OSV. Even BOPs have parameters that they are designed to operate at. Annulus may have collapsed also on outside diameter of well allowing gas to find path to sea floor other than in pipe as designed. This is why i think BP can't just cap off the well but is instead sucking up as much as it can. If they cap the well, the pressure builds and relieves itself through seams to the seafloor. As for BOP, John Gall has an axiom in Systemantics, the way systems act up that states: When a Fail Safe System Fails It Fails to Fail Safely. That's why I don't stick my hand in elevator doors to get on when doors are closing.

[Paladin2]

"That's why I don't stick my hand in elevator doors to get on when doors are closing. "

Here too.

I also agree that the well is likely unstable should they actually be able to cap it off at the top.

The "simple" solution to me is to drill a bunch of surrounding wells and pump them like H! to try to drop the local pressure at the surrounded bad boy.

[T-Bird45]

FTA:

2. There is no reason to believe the blow out preventer was defective. The probability of a similar result is high for any crew using the same casing and cement program that was used here.

What about the comment on 60 Minutes a few weeks ago from the chief electrical engineer about rubber from the top of the BOP being found in the circulating mud by the mud engineer? What about operational defects in the control system backups? Why did the shear rams fail to operate as designed?

[Xenalyte]

Jeeeeeez, guy gets it wrong in the VERY FIRST POINT (AFE does not mean “approved for expenditure”). What else did he blitz?