Come on, everybody knows the mother ship hides behind the sun, not in Area 51.
Kuwait Owns 27% of BP; 95% Of BP Oil comes from US; BP refine/stores it in Texas; Kuwait Sets price; Sells it in US! Our OWN OIL
Yo Everybody! I worked off shore on oil rigs in the early 80s for about 6 years, on the coast of TX tof Port Lavaca, about 40 miles into the gulf, on the edge of the contintental shelf. The water out there is only about 80 ft deep and the rig was jacked up about 40ft over the water and I thnk I know a little about whats going on. Theres more to oil exploration over the water than sticking a pipe in the ground and sucking the oil out of it. I worked my way up from a roustabout, roughneck, to motorman and assistant driller. The first thing after the rig is in place you have to start driving casing these are 40 ft sections of 14" schedule 80 pipe, they're drivin into the bedrock with a pile driver. As each section is driven in another is placed on top and welded, this process goes on till you're in solid bedrock. The mud and seawater are cleaned out and the blow out preventer (Christmas Tree) is installed on top of the casing. The lip that carries the drill pipes up to the drill floor is called the Kelly. The drill bit is fastened to the pipe and lowered to the casing through the blowout preventer. The blowout preventer is 2 hygdraulic rams that will shear the drill pipe if you have to shut down the well. The preventer also has series of valves and pipes that helps control the well. The pipe is loaded into the well at 30ft a section, they are fastened together by either throwing a chain or using the hydraulic spinners. The rotary is a device that holds the pipe on the deck and also turns with the Kelly when it spins the pipe. The Kelly lowers the pipe and you start drilling. We used to say joints come in 30ft sections and dope (Grease) comes in a 5gal bucket. The Kelly turns the pipe deeper into the whole and now you are drilling. At the same time, drilling fluid called mud with a heavy viscosity is puimped through the drill stem pipe down where the drill bit is cutting and circulates up through the casing to the shaker house where the cuttings are separated and quality control keeps checking them. This is a standard procedure until you start hitting gas and methane which you will get long before you get to oil. The deepest hole I was on was about 18,000ft. When you hit that gas the well will want to kick back because of the tremendous pressure, you will have to burn off the gas with a device something like a gigantic rose bud from an acetelyn torch. In the mean time you keep cirulating with the mud. I've seen the time when we burned off more gas than you could heat a large city with. It wasn't reclaimed because it was contaminated. After the gas is burned off and the mud weight viscosity was satisfactory the drilling would continue. All the years I was srilling we brought in only 1 oil well.
WHAT CAUSED THE OIL SPILL???
They were over a mile deep and hit gas. They tried to circulate but the pressure was too immense and the well was kicking back. They tried to shut down the well but the blowout preventer would not function. Last resort, they tried to pump cement into the well to close it off. By that time the gas has started coming up around the casing and they were in big trouble. Something sparked off the gas and you have a fire. You can say GOODBYE to the oil well. It was the oil companies fault for not maintaining their equipment and maintenance and safety prodecures.
The Oil Companies are pointing their fingers at each other and then the Government gets involved and the Gulf of Mexico is one he ll of a mess.
This comes from my own experience. Shoulda never happened!!
Have a good day
buzzard
well thanks buzz you gave me some hope now , when you said bedrock i knew it was an hard drill . we had an deep well put in here and the guy broke three drill s. so i can imagine what this bed rock stuff is like. i dont mind people talking about the goverment and how they are not god nor are we all. i have never cared for them and im 53 years old lol. i just dont like dem / rep talk and try my very best to stay away from it at all forums. if they is one somewhere on the site then i dont want to go to it./ but i do beleive in freedom of speach , and freedom of religion , as long as it is not freedom from religion lol. im not going to wait for them > the goverment . if i had of , i would be liveing in a sewer lol> if that good. been all over the usa from the bronx to fla ca la va ms hmmmm well i was a young man at one time lol . they need robot mini skimers that go like the new vacum cleaners. run on battiers and have solar panels on the tops of them. and set them loose in the marshes. have them programed in to dump at at docking station and go back to work on a new area. i love to invent! its in my blood. but i cant save the world. tesla was a great man and im inspired by ideas. its is a lot of stress on me and others. we just want it stoped. my health conditions are bad , but ya know what buzz , you can all ways look around and see worse and be thankful! ---michael j fox is just an kid and his illness is a hard one. you dont have to be old to be ill. god forbid ill wind in a nurising home someday.. like lynard skinard says "you wont find me in no old folks home'' you got that right ;; buzz. I know you may not want any parts of an oil rig buzz , but if you know some one and can help you will be our hero! now that i have said this i ask and plead every one at this site.. (( remember))) come memorial day !!!! thanks and im still kicking !kicking, no need to aplogize for a political commentary, that isn't what this is about. It effects everyone.. with or without the political bally hoo sticking its nose in.
It's going to have further reaches than any of us can imagine. The O rings were probably off of the blowout preventer which has many high pressured seals. With the rigs log and daily report log missing who knows what actually transpired before the big blow.
Directional drilling in my opinion will be the only way they can shut down the well. They'll have to run a horizontal shaft into the casing if its still there and perforate a hole to relieve the pressure on the shaft. If the casing is not there they'll have to go lower and try to hit the main shaft. This means drilling through solid rock and very difficult to do from the top side. A few degrees off either way they could miss the shaft completely. If they do succeed they are going to have to be ready for it because it will have a lot of pressure built up. With all the modern technology that the oil field has now it can be done but will be very difficult. I understand they are working on it now but it will take in my opinion at least a month or so. We have to realize that June 1 is the start of hurricane season and if there's a big one come into the gulf it will be huge disaster--more than we have now. Tonights Night Line showed how devastating it is already. I wish them all the luck in the world because its going to take a lot of luck to fix this devastation.
Sorry to read of your dislexia. Its not really rare, but still very inconveniet especially with numbers. We have a few friends that suffer with it. I know how hard it can be for them to even read a newspaper at times. It used to be that reading through different colored cell papers helped but I understand that isn't even viable any more.
Guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens. Who knows how they'll get this all cleaned up-- certainly not with panty hose and hair. lol
buzzard