Oil Spill Commission Finds Tests Warned of BP's Well Before Blowout

FoxNews.com ^ | October 28, 2010 | Associated Press

[topher]

WASHINGTON -- Tests performed before the deadly blowout of BP's oil well in the Gulf of Mexico should have raised doubts about the cement used to seal the well, but the company and its cementing contractor used it anyway, investigators with the president's oil spill commission said Thursday.

It's the first finding from the commission looking into the causes of the April 20 explosion that killed 11 workers and led to the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history. And it appears to conflict with statements made by Halliburton Co., which has said tests showed the cement mix was stable.

The cement mix's failure to prevent oil and gas from entering the well has been identified by BP and others as one of the causes of the accident.

...

[topher]

From the article:

Independent tests conducted for the commission by Chevron on a nearly identical mixture were also released Thursday. The results conclude the cement mix was unstable, raising questions about the validity of Halliburton's final test.

I find the technical aspects of the article interesting.

But one question remains: they should have had a tested cement for plugging such a deepwater well.

Were they trying to test a new cement in an unsafe environment? The article does not give enough information to say. Probably FreeRepublic Poster Thackney has an opinion...

[topher]

Ping.

Maybe Obama trying to blame the oil companies...

[topher]

It is much later in the article that they talk about Four tests being done

The results of the four tests were not shared with British Petroleum before the oil spill.

From the article, it is unclear if management at Halliburton had analyzed the results of the four tests before the oil spill.

[FromLori]

Halliburton Shares Crash on Cement Test

Snippet..

Shares of Halliburton(HAL_) dropped by as much as 10% on Thursday afternoon after a presidential commission revealed that tests conducted before the BP Macondo oil spill showed that cement used by Halliburton were liable to create unstable conditions.

The presidential commission said Halliburton did not send any alarm signals to BP, though Halliburton did communicate the results of cement tests. The commission also stressed that BP’s full knowledge of the cement problems is still unknown.

More

http://www.thestreet.com/story/10903898/1/halliburton-shares-crash-on-cement-test.html

Firms Knew of Cement Flaws Before Spill, Panel Says

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/us/29spill.html

[Qwackertoo]

Oh great. I’m not looking at my HAL shares today. Or this week. And maybe next week too.

[edcoil]

Didn’t reports tell our government something was up on 9/11 but they all said it did not say airplanes and NY so how could we know???

[Deaf Smith]

They were not plugging the well, they were cementing the final string casing to the well bore (outside of casing to the inside bore hole).

Haliburton's use of nitrogen injected cement did not do so well in the early 80's on high pressure gas wells (on shore)...tended to blow out of the hole and cover the rig & location.

A two stage cementing job was the thing back then.

[Sacajaweau]

Tests "on a nearly identical mixture".

Nearly?? in concrete testing?? Thinking back....I'm thinking "temperature problem"...