Fire on a drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico. New spill in the Gulf of Mexico

oil production platform, the explosion on which led to an environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010

The Deepwater Horizon oil platform and the history of its creation and operation, the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform, which resulted in a major environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, the causes of the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon and the elimination of the consequences

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Deepwater Horizon - definition

Oil oil production semi-submersible platform, which was built from South Korea by Hyundai Heavy Industries, and commissioned by Transocean in 2001. The Deepwater Horizon platform is known for the explosion that occurred on it in April 2010, and the major environmental disaster that followed.

oil platform accident Deepwater horizon

Semi-submersible ultra-deepwater vessel with a dynamic positioning system, built in 2001 by the South Korean shipbuilding company Hyundai Heavy Industries.

Seconds before the "Deepwater horizon" disaster

A drilling platform owned by the British oil producing company British Petroleum (BP).

explosion on oil platform Deepwater horizon

The Deepwater Horizon platform is platform, which was laid down on March 21, 2000 in Ulsan (35°33’00” N; 129°19’00” E) at the world’s largest shipyard by the South Korean shipbuilding company Hyundai Heavy Industries. The platform was accepted into operation on February 21, 2001 by Transocean.

Deepwater Horizon

The Deepwater Horizon oil platform is platform that has successfully operated in the Atlantis (BP 56%, Petroleum Deepwater 44%) and Thunder Horse (BP 75%, ExxonMobil 25%) oil fields in the Gulf of Mexico. In 2006, with its help, oil was found in the Kaskida field, and in September 2009, the Deepwater Horizon Platform drilled the deepest well at that time in the Gulf of Mexico in the area of ​​the giant Tiber field, reaching a depth of 10,680 m, of which 1,259 m was water.

Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster

Deepwater Horizon is deepwater oil platform operated by British BP.

Deepwater Horizon

The Deepwater Horizon platform is deepwater oil platform that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.

burning platform Oil platform Deepwater Horizon

The Deepwater Horizon platform is operator BP, which was drilling in the Gulf of Mexico when it exploded and created one of the largest oil spills in world history.

Accident in the Gulf of Mexico

The Deepwater Horizon platform is operator BP was drilling in the Gulf of Mexico when it exploded and created one of the largest oil spills in world history.

extinguishing a fire on an oil production platform Deepwater Horizon

The Deepwater Horizon oil platform is deepwater, dynamic semi-submersible drilling platform owned by Transocean. It was built in 2001 in South Korea by Hyundai Heavy Industries for R&B Falcon, which later became part of Transocean. Since 2001, it has been rented out to BP.

Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico

History of the Deepwater Horizon platform

Semi-submersible oil platform The Deepwater Horizon ultra-deepwater drilling platform with a dynamic positioning system was built by the South Korean shipbuilding company Hyundai Heavy Industries for R&B Falcon, which became part of Transocean Ltd. in 2001. Oil platform The Deepwater Horizon oil platform was laid down on March 21, 2000 and launched on February 23, 2001.

The technical characteristics of the platform are as follows: length – 112 m, width – 78 m, height – 97.4 m; average draft – 23 m; displacement - 52587 tons; cargo capacity - 32588 tons; power plant – diesel-electric with a capacity of 42 MW; speed – 4 knots; crew - 146 people.

Deepwater Horizon oil rig accident

The Deepwater Horizon oil production platform was leased to BP for three years in 2001, and in July 2001 it arrived in the Gulf of Mexico, subsequently the lease was extended several times, and in 2005 it was re-signed for a period from September 2005 to September 2010 , it was later extended again for a period from September 2010 to September 2013.

platform Deepwater Horizon platform

In February 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oil platform began drilling a well at a depth of 1,500 meters in the Macondo field. The Macondo field development was sold to BP in March 2008; it subsequently sold 25% to Anadarko and 10% to MOEX Offshore 2007 LLC (a subsidiary of Mitsui).

Deepwater Horizon fire

Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion

Explosion of oil oil production platform Deepwater horizon is accident (explosion and fire) that occurred on April 20, 2010, 80 kilometers off the coast of Louisiana in the Gulf of Mexico on the Deepwater Horizon oil production platform in the Macondo field.

explosion on the Deepwater Horizon platform

The oil spill that followed the accident became the largest in history and turned the accident into one of the largest man-made disasters in terms of its negative impact on the environmental situation.

Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico

The explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform killed 11 people and injured 17 of the 126 people on the platform. At the end of June 2010, reports appeared about the death of 2 more people during the liquidation of the consequences of the disaster.

fire on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform

Due to damage to well pipes at a depth of 1,500 meters, about 5 million barrels of oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico over 152 days; the oil slick reached an area of ​​75 thousand square kilometers.

Firefighting on the Deepwater Horizon

On April 20, 2010, at 22:00 local time or at 7:00 MSK (UTC+4) On April 21, 2010, an explosion occurred on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform, which US Coast Guard Petty Officer Blair Doten describes as follows:

“The best way to describe it is as a large mushroom cloud, as if a bomb had gone off.”

extinguishing a fire on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform

After the explosion, a fire started on the platform, which they unsuccessfully tried to extinguish from fire boats, while a column of smoke rose to a height of 3 kilometers. The fire lasted 36 hours and on April 22, 2010, the oil platform Deepwater Horizon oil platform sank.

BP reaches agreement with oil spill victims

According to Robert Bee, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, the methane bubble arose at great depths due to heating that occurred as a result of a chemical reaction during well cementation - one of the standard ones for underwater drilling. The increase in temperature caused the transition of methane from a liquid to a gaseous state, after which the bubble, increasing in size as it rose from depth and pressure dropped, broke through the barriers in its path and burst to the surface.

accident on oil platform deepwater horizon

The first explosion, according to the professor, most likely occurred in the engines installed on the drilling platform, which, due to gas entering them, operated at extremely high speeds. The ensuing fire led to an explosion of the oil mixture, which was thrown to the surface along with the methane.

Deepwater Horizon explosion

Chronicle of events on Deepwater Horizon

Problems on the platform began almost from the first day of its installation, that is, from the beginning of February 2010. The well was drilled in a hurry, and the reason is simple and banal: the Deepwater Horizon oil production platform was taken by BP in Rentau, and every day it cost half a million!

fire on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig

Many working platforms, until the morning of April 20, were not aware of changes in the well pressure testing procedure (testing for leaks), which determines the safety of further operation of the platform. They were puzzled that BP decided to remove an unusually large amount of thick drilling mud (fluid) from the well before testing. The most advanced technologies are used. BP uses some of the fastest computers in the world to explore oil reservoirs. Underwater robots work in wells several miles deep. But the truth about the modern oil industry is that it often relies on people's opinions and instincts. We need to listen to the well, they say. On April 20, a small group of men on the Deepwater Horizon platform listened to the nearly completed well and did not understand what it wanted to tell them.

An accident in the Gulf of Mexico will destroy the southern United States

Gulf of Mexico: oil flows, BP becomes cheaper

But that day the sun rose over the calm sea and it seemed that this nightmare would soon end. Workers had completed drilling the well 11 days earlier and were now reinforcing it with steel and cement. There was little left to do, and workers were already starting to worry about the next task, Morel would later tell BP during an internal investigation after the accident. But before personnel at the Deepwater Horizon oil platform could move on to other work, a leak test remained to be done to ensure the cement and steel were in good contact, preventing the possibility of a gas leak. If the test is successful, giant cement plugs (the size of a football field) are installed on the well and it is temporarily mothballed until BP is ready to pump oil and gas from it.

view of the platform oil platform Deepwater Horizon

Despite its importance, the administration of this test and its interpretation are left to the discretion of platform personnel. And different drilling rigs have different procedures. Typically, the drilling fluid is first removed approximately 90 m below the blowout preventer and replaced with seawater. Because this solution precipitates gas before removing large amounts of it, companies typically test the well to make sure it is protected from gas influx. But BP engineers in Houston, including Morel and his colleague Mark Hafle, decided to install the cement plug much deeper than usual and remove 10 times more solution before testing. This was unusual, but BP says it changed the procedure to avoid a leak.

The accident in the Gulf of Mexico deprived the United States of hope

Sepulvado, who was on shore that day with his phone turned off, admitted in an affidavit that he had never conducted a test involving the removal of such quantities of drilling fluid and had not heard of any such case at BP. The company says the change in procedure has been agreed with the regulator. Indeed, BP applied to federal regulators for permission to use a deeper cement plug on April 16 and received approval just 20 minutes later. But the platform staff found out about this only on the day of the tests, on the morning of April 20.

When BP day shift manager Robert Calusa made the announcement at the 11 a.m. daily meeting in the platform's screening room, Jimmy Wayne Harrell, Transocean's team leader and the most experienced worker on the platform, protested. Harrell and Calusa were arguing about a "negative test," according to one witness. "That's how it will be done," Calusa said, according to a witness affidavit, and Harrell "reluctantly agreed." He himself denied in an affidavit that he argued with Calusa. However, according to his lawyer Pat Fanning, Harrell told Calusa he didn't want to remove so much solution before testing, but was defeated. Calusa could not be reached for comment.

BP oil company employees accused of killing 11 people

Soon a helicopter landed on the platform, on which representatives of Transocean and BP management flew in - the managers just wanted to look at the platform. For most of the rest of the workday, Harrell showed them the platform. By 5 p.m., Transocean workers had already removed most of the drilling fluid and began pressure testing the well, according to the chronology of events reconstructed by BP. The check failed. The pressure suddenly increased, and no one knew why. The workers located in the central “drill hut” (something like a room) could not interpret the instrument readings. Then Harrell and his VIP entourage entered, but the managers quickly left and Harrell lingered. He didn't see a major problem, but he ordered one of the workers to tighten the valve at the top of the blowout preventer, a device that is supposed to seal the wellhead in an emergency, to prevent drilling fluid above from flowing down. As it seemed then, this solved the problem. Harrell testified that he was pleased with the results of the tests and returned to the visitors. The second man on the team after Harrell, Randy Ezell, spent a few minutes more in the “drill hut”, but soon also left to accompany the guests. He later testified to a joint Coast Guard-Interior Ministry panel that if it had not been for the guests, he would have spent more time getting to the bottom of the situation.

With Harrell gone, the controversy continued. Wyman Wheeler, a drilling foreman on the day shift, wasn't convinced everything was okay. Wheeler led the drilling crew for 12 hours every day. "Wyman was convinced that something was wrong," testified Christopher Pleasant, another Transocean worker. Wheeler could not be reached for comment.

Oil Chernobyl

Wheeler's shift ended at six o'clock on the evening of April 20. Jason Anderson took over duty, and Pleasant said he had his own interpretation of the test results. Anderson was respected by his colleagues, and he assured them that there was nothing unusual about the blood pressure readings. Calusa decided to test whether this was true by contacting Donald Vidrine, an experienced BP manager who relieved Calusa at 6 p.m. Two BP employees conferred for an hour. Vidrine bombarded Calusa with questions and was not satisfied with the answers. “I wanted to do another review,” he said, according to notes from the internal investigation reviewed by the WSJ.

Workers ran the leak test again, but this time the results were even more confusing. According to preliminary findings from BP's internal investigation, readings from the small pipe extending from the well were normal, but sensors on the main pipe showed increased pressure. But both pipes were connected and should have shown the same pressure. It was unclear what was happening in the well. Finally, around 7:50 p.m., Vidrine, Pleasant said, made a decision: He turned to his colleague Calusa and told him he should call BP engineers in Houston and tell them he was satisfied with the test results. Vidrine himself, through his lawyer, declined to comment. There were other signs that the well was out of control: according to electronic readings reviewed by investigators after the explosion, more fluid began leaking from the well than was pumped into it.

Equipment Oil platform Deepwater horizon

But none of the Transocean workers monitoring the well noticed these signs.

At about nine o'clock in the evening the visit of top managers came to an end. Some of them walked to the well bridge where they were shown a simulator, a video game that allowed crew members to practice maintaining the Deepwater Horizon oil platform in the correct position in severe weather conditions. Among those who approached was BP's recently appointed vice president of drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico, Pat O'Bryan, who received a doctorate from Louisiana State University for his work measuring gas leaks in an oil well. At that time, a gas leak was going on, and O'Bryan was standing on bridge near the video simulator.

drilling diagram Oil production platform Deepwater horizon

Ezell, the platform's second-most senior employee, was lying in his bed watching TV when his phone rang, according to testimony he gave to federal investigators in May. It was 21.50 on the clock. “We have a serious situation,” Steve Curtis, a driller's assistant, told him. "Randy, we need your help." Ezell stood up, got dressed and was reaching for his helmet when he heard the alarm. Before he could pick up the helmet, the first of two powerful explosions rocked the platform.

extinguishing a fire on the Deepwater Horizon platform

In the next few minutes, Anderson and Curtis were killed and Wheeler was seriously wounded. The blowout preventer did not operate. And most of those who made important decisions on April 20 were saving their lives.

work on the Deepwater Horizon

Calusa also refused to testify to the federal investigative commission, citing his rights under the Fifth Amendment. With the same reference, Morel also refused to testify to the federal investigative commission. Morel's lawyer declined to comment on this story.

Disaster on Oil Platform Deepwater Horizon

Victims and injured as a result of the explosion

At the time of the explosion, there were 126 people on the Deepwater Horizon, of which 79 were employees of Transocean Ltd. (including platform commander Capt. Curt Kuchta), 7 BP employees, the rest were employees of Anadarko, Halliburton and M-I SWACO.

victims of explosion on oil platform deepwater horizon

As a result of the explosion, 11 people went missing (initially 15 were reported missing), and the search for them was stopped on the night of April 24, 2010. Among the dead, who were local residents, were 9 employees of Transocean Ltd. and 2 M-I SWACO employees.

2010 tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico

115 people were evacuated, including 17 wounded who were evacuated by helicopter. As of April 23, 2010, only two victims remained in hospitals; their health condition did not cause concern among doctors.

At the end of June 2010, reports appeared about the death of 2 more people during the liquidation of the consequences of the disaster.

Hayward: Gulf of Mexico accident is a personal tragedy

Oil spill due to Deepwater Horizon accident

According to initial estimates, 1,000 barrels of oil per day leaked into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico; later, by the end of April 2010, the volume of oil leakage was estimated at 5,000 barrels of oil per day.

According to USGS data released on June 10, 2010, the amount of oil leaked up to June 3 was between 20,000 and 40,000 barrels of oil.

BP reports cleanup of oil leak in Gulf of Mexico

Fighting the spread of an oil spill

The oil spill response was coordinated by a special team led by the US Coast Guard, which included representatives from various federal agencies.

As of April 29, 2010, the rescue operation involved a BP flotilla consisting of 49 tugs, barges, rescue boats and other vessels, and 4 submarines were also used. On May 2, 2010, 76 ships, 5 aircraft, about 1,100 people had already participated in the operation, 6,000 military personnel of the US National Guard, military personnel and equipment of the US Navy and the US Air Force were also involved.

The process had to pump out.oil Firefighting on the Deepwater Horizon

BP report

On September 8, 2010 at 15:00 MSK, BP published a 193-page report on the investigation into the cause of the explosion at the Deepwater Horizon oil platform, which was prepared over four months by a team of more than 50 specialists, led by Mark Bligh, BP's head of operational safety.

According to the BP report, the causes of the accident were human factors, in particular incorrect decisions by personnel, technical problems and design flaws of the oil platform; in total, six main causes of the disaster were named.

According to the report, the cement pad at the bottom of the well was unable to retain hydrocarbons in the reservoir, which is why gas and condensate leaked through it into the drill string. After this, specialists from BP and Transocean Ltd. misinterpreted pressure measurements in the well when checking the well for leaks. Then, within 40 minutes, Transocean Ltd. specialists. did not notice that there was a flow of hydrocarbons coming from the well. Gas that may have been vented overboard spread throughout the drilling platform through the ventilation system and fire suppression systems were unable to prevent its spread. After the explosion, due to a malfunction of the mechanisms, the anti-discharge fuse, which was supposed to automatically plug the well and prevent oil leakage in the event of an accident, did not work.

Report from BOEMRE and the US Coast Guard

In total, the report identified 35 causes that led to the explosion, fire and oil spill. In 21 reasons, BP is the only culprit; in 8 reasons, BP was found to be partially at fault. Guilt was also found in the actions of Transocean Ltd. (the owner of the platform) and Halliburton (the contractor that carried out the deepwater cementing of the well).

breakthrough at the Macondo well

The only person named in the report is BP engineer Mark Haifle, who chose not to conduct an analysis to determine cement quality and refused to investigate anomalies found in another important analysis.

Sources and links

Sources of texts, pictures and videos

ru.wikipedia.org – free encyclopedia Wikipedia

mdservices.kz – site about drilling and drilling equipment

industrial-disasters.ru – site about man-made disasters

eco-pravda.ru – online newspaper Ecological Truth

novostienergetiki.ru – energy news website

astrokras.narod.ru – Astrology website in Krasnoyarsk

top.rbc.ru – information and news website of the RBC agency

neftegaz.ru – information site about oil and gas

neftegaz.ru – information and news site about oil and gas

welkat.org – website Encyclopedia of Disasters

gosnadzor.info - website of the Organization for the Promotion of Environmental Safety

riskprom.ru - site about hazard analysis and assessment of man-made

dok20580.livejournal.com - blog on LiveJournal

vesti.ru - online newspaper "Vesti"

dp.ru - information and news portal

ria.ru - information and news portal RIA-Novosti

newstube.ru - news video hosting

youtube.com - video hosting

Sources of Internet services

wordstat.yandex.ru - a service from Yandex that allows you to analyze search queries

video.yandex.ru - search for videos on the Internet via Yandex

images.yandex.ru - image search through the Yandex service

maps.yandex.ru - maps from Yandex to search for places described in the material

Application links

windows.microsoft.com - website of Microsoft, which created the Windows OS

office.microsoft.com - website of the corporation that created Microsoft Office

chrome.google.ru - a frequently used browser for working with websites

hyperionics.com - website of the creators of the HyperSnap screenshot program

getpaint.net - free software for working with images

A year ago, a deepwater drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. American ecologist Carl Safina summarizes the consequences of the disaster for the ecosystems of this water area. In his opinion, in general, the consequences are not as tragic as panicked observers predicted shortly after the event. But this relative impunity was more the result of a happy coincidence than a sign of the natural invulnerability of the natural system. Human technology, psychological and professional training are not yet able to cope with the risks that invariably arise during deep-sea oil drilling. Disasters are obligatory and inevitable. Carl Safina is convinced that government investment in deep-sea drilling is short-sighted and an economic dead-end. It is necessary to invest as many resources as possible, material and creative, into the development of alternative energy production.

First of all, Safina recalls the chronology of the disaster itself.

However, many adult individuals migrated to the open sea at this time of year. After the explosion, 500 individuals of these turtles were recorded, but many apparently died not from oil contamination, but from damage from fishing gear of local fishermen. Many, anticipating the imminent ban on fishing at sea, tried to catch more ahead of time, using all available fishing gear. Conservation services tried to compensate for the loss of the population of this rare species and transported 70,000 turtle eggs to the Gulf Coast. However, the result of this rescue operation will only be clear after a decade and a half, since the Atlantic ridley breeds once every 12–20 years.

As for the death of fish stocks in the waters of the bay, the situation here is not at all catastrophic. After the introduction of a fishing ban, stocks invariably and very quickly recover. This was the case after the death of fish populations that occurred after the Exxon Valdez disaster - and, in all likelihood, it will continue to be the case now.

It is noted that the oil film that covered the bottom sediments in some parts of the bay caused the death of bottom infauna and deep-sea corals.

The gigantic amount of oil that spilled into the waters of the bay, at a relatively high average annual water temperature, should be very quickly processed by bacterial microflora and converted into carbon dioxide. So bacterial processes should greatly reduce the effects of pollution.

The most serious concerns are about the fate of the water meadows of the Mississippi River Delta.

The river carries a huge amount of sediment, forming a delta territory over 4–5 thousand years, protruding into the sea for tens of kilometers. The delta's channels change their route, the high humidity and productivity of the soil create favorable conditions for vegetation, and the biodiversity in the delta is staggeringly high. Therefore, pollution of these areas really threatens serious losses of biodiversity.

The numbers are as follows: as a result of the disaster, out of 18,000 km 2 of flooded meadows, 9 km 2 were covered with oil spills. By the end of summer, normal vegetation had already resumed in these contaminated areas. 9 km 2 - is it a lot or a little? For comparison, data on anthropogenic destruction of the delta territory are presented: during the exploitation of the delta lands, the area decreased by 5 thousand km 2; The annual rate of area reduction is estimated at 100–200 km 2 . So 9 km 2 of oil spills do not look very impressive against the background of other environmentally aggressive factors.

The main reasons for the reduction of delta areas are considered to be the regulation of flow, which disrupts the natural terrigenous drift, which replenishes the washing out of the delta by sea water, and the subsidence of land fragments due to oil production in these territories.

Therefore, when analyzing the consequences, the question naturally arises: was this disaster the “greatest disaster in history”, as US President Barack Obama called it?

This particular catastrophe, apparently, did not happen. Neutralizing human sluggishness and shortsightedness, circumstances accidentally turned out in favor of nature: massive populations of birds and mammals were located far to the north, most of the oil floated to the surface without reaching the bottom fauna, and hungry bacteria processed the oil lakes. Things could have been much, much worse.

But, as the author of the review notes, the worst thing is that the main lesson from this disaster concerns not immediate measures to comply with environmental safety, but the general policy of energy production. Deep-sea drilling, on which many fuel companies, and along with them the governments of oil-producing countries, are now placing serious hopes, is an extremely dangerous undertaking. Human technology, human psychology and training are not yet ready to cope with the risks of deep-sea oil production. And it is unlikely that they will cope in the foreseeable future. It is necessary to reorient technological search to alternative tasks, creative and raw materials. But Karl Safina has serious and justified concerns that government officials are not distinguished by such foresight.

Petrobras pipeline disaster in 2000. Explosion at the French chemical plant AZF in 2001. An explosion on a Pemex oil platform off the coast of Mexico in April of this year. The history of oil production is rich in disasters. But the largest accident with the most severe environmental consequences to date occurred in 2010. The Deepwater Horizon oil platform, operated by the British company BP in the Gulf of Mexico, exploded off the coast of the US state of Louisiana.

She drowned

On April 20, 2010, a powerful explosion occurred at the Deepwater Horizon, causing a large fire. In total, at the time of the incident, 126 people were on the drilling platform the size of two football fields and about 2.6 million liters of petroleum products were stored. This figure alone gives an idea of ​​the scale of the disaster.

You can imagine the consequences, knowing that the fire lasted 36 hours, after which the platform sank, and oil flowed out of a well at a depth of 1500 meters in a continuous stream. According to some sources, this leak amounted to 5 thousand barrels per day (i.e. 700 tons of oil), according to others - up to 100 thousand (about 14 thousand tons).

They tried to fight the escaping oil in different ways: they fenced it off, burned it, collected it with the help of sorbents, covered the well with a huge protective dome. BP even organized a campaign to collect human and animal hair, which was stuffed into nylon bags and used as blotters to collect oil. The campaign unfolded on a large scale: according to the charitable organization Matter of Trust, 370 thousand salons around the world participated in the campaign, and 200 tons of hair and wool were received at collection points every day.

In the hair collection campaign, BP was quite successful. But the campaign to collect oil failed. As experts explain, the “spill and immediately collect” technology is not suitable a day after the accident - it sinks to the bottom and it is useless to install fences. Neither microorganisms that break down oil, nor sorbents simply could cope with such volumes of oil. And they failed. According to environmentalists, about 37 thousand tons of oil are hidden in the soil around the Macondo well, which is from 5 to 14% of the total volume of oil released. As the researchers note, this oil is still at the bottom, but it will gradually seep back into the water. This will lead to serious environmental consequences, since oil in the bottom layers of the sea disintegrates very slowly due to lack of oxygen.

What is the reason?

The accident on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform is recognized as one of the largest disasters in human history. It is compared to the collapse of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and is even called “oil Chernobyl.” Both disasters have one thing in common - they could not cope with the consequences of the crashes for a long time, because such a scenario was not provided for in the project.

According to the head of the environmental company Greenpeace Russia, Vladimir Chuprov, today in the oil industry there are no technologies at all that 100% exclude the possibility of such disasters. And when they do occur, it turns out that there is no technology to eliminate the consequences of accidents of this scale.

And yet, BP had a chance to “prepare”, because experts, even before the collapse of the platform, argued that the death of the Deepwater Horizon was only a matter of time.

The oil platform was launched in February 2001. In the same year, it was leased to BP, which brought Deepwater Horizon to the Gulf of Mexico and 9 years later, in February 2010, began drilling a well in the Macondo field. Then the problems began: the drilling work was carried out in a hurry. And it’s understandable, because the platform cost BP half a million dollars every day, which means the company needed to quickly start mining and making money. One thing they did not take into account is that in the event of a disaster, BP faces huge financial costs and responsibility for eliminating the consequences of the crash. But, as already mentioned, such a scenario was not included in the project.

Several organizations were involved in the investigation into the causes of the accident: the US Department of Homeland Security and the US Department of the Interior, the US Congress and the US Department of Justice. BP considered it its duty to conduct its own investigation into the causes of the accident. 50 specialists, led by Mark Bligh, BP's head of operational safety, were working to determine the cause of the disaster. As a result, the BP company published a report according to which the main reason for the collapse of the platform was... the human factor. And just six reasons for “concern” were named. A more thorough report was made by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Resources Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) and the US Coast Guard. Of the 35 causes of the disaster, BP was the only culprit in 21, and in 8 the company was found to be partially at fault.

Perhaps BP was right, and the human factor really became one of the reasons for the death of Deepwater Horizon - in the pursuit of profit and in an attempt to reduce the costs of developing a well, the company neglected basic safety standards. Other causes include poor well design with insufficient barriers to oil and gas, unsuccessful cementing, and last-minute changes to the well development project.

Partial blame is admitted to the owners of the oil platform, Transocean Ltd., and Halliburton, which was involved in underwater cementing of the well.

Why is the Gulf of Mexico suffering?

So, the “human factor” of BP’s activities on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform turned, first of all, into a global environmental disaster. So global that in its scale this disaster eclipsed the crash of the Exxon Valdez tanker in Alaska, the Prestige ship in Spain, and most other accidents previously recognized as the largest oil spills in terms of scale.

In a few words, the consequences of the platform crash are as follows.

During the 152 days that oil continuously leaked from the damaged well, more than 5 million barrels entered the Gulf waters.

The waters of the Gulf of Mexico are known to be rich in commercial fish, oysters and shrimp, rare species of birds nest along the shores of the gulf, and numerous tourists come to relax on the beaches of the gulf. But the spilled oil even reached coastal reserves and marshes, and the coasts of several states from Florida to Louisiana were contaminated. The latter introduced an almost complete ban on fishing. And the beaches of other states have been closed to vacationers for several months. In addition, nearly 600 sea turtles, 100 dolphins, more than 6,000 birds were found dead, and increased mortality among whales and dolphins continued over the next few years

But the greatest concern among scientists was the impact of the consequences of the accident on the climate-forming Gulf Stream. According to some estimates, the temperature of the current decreased by 10 degrees. The current began to break up into separate underwater flows. Some weather anomalies were noticed. And all this just during the oil spill after the death of the Deepwater Horizon. Of course, this can only be a coincidence, and experts have not come to a common conclusion on this issue. However, this fact still worries some scientists.

Who is to blame and what was done?

After the accident, thousands of lawsuits were filed in the courts, with BP and Transocean as the main defendants. The first to appeal to the courts were local fishermen, coastal property owners, real estate agencies and restaurateurs. In early 2012, they were joined by lawsuits from business owners and government organizations whose businesses suffered losses due to the oil spill. The lawsuits against BP were brought by shareholders of the companies, where the main plaintiffs were the pension funds of the states of New York and Ohio. The reason for the lawsuits is “providing false information about the safety of drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.”

BP and Transocean violated the Clean Water Act, which allowed the US Department of Justice to file a lawsuit in federal court in the US city of New Orleans (Louisiana). The American government demanded a fine from companies ranging from 1.1 to 4.3 thousand dollars for each barrel of leaked oil. And if Transocean pleaded guilty and paid almost $1.5 billion in fines, then BP representatives decided to “put the hurt on their head” and filed a lawsuit against Transocean in the federal court of New Orleans, accusing the contractor of poorly performed work and technical violations safety, which was the main cause of the accident. And if so, then, according to BP, Transocean is obliged to bear financial responsibility for eliminating the consequences of the disaster.

By the way, Transocean is not the only organization that fell under the “hot hand” of BP. The company accused Cameron International of liability for failures of a blowout preventer installed at the well. And Halliburton was hit with a lawsuit alleging “fraud, negligence and concealment of facts about the materials used.” However, as federal judge Carl Barbier ruled, 67% of the blame for the accident lies with BP itself, and only 30% and 3% with Transocean and Halliburton, respectively. In 2012, a federal court in New Orleans issued a decision imposing a fine of $7.8 billion on BP. This is the amount of compensation that the court ordered BP to pay to 100,000 plaintiffs affected by the oil spill. However, according to company representatives, payment of this amount does not constitute an admission of guilt in the accident.

In February 2013, a new trial began in a New Orleans court regarding the accident in the Gulf of Mexico. The actors are still the same - British BP, its partners and representatives of the American government, demanding payment of the maximum fine, i.e. 4.3 thousand dollars for each barrel of oil that fell into the water. The British company tried to challenge this claim and reduce the fine to 3 thousand per barrel. But the course of the investigation did not play into BP’s hands: it turned out that one of the company’s engineers, Kurt Meeks, tried to destroy correspondence that discussed important internal BP information. In particular, about the attempts of specialists to preserve the well after the accident. It also turned out that the oil producing company provided information that downplayed the amount of oil that leaked.

In 2014, the British government decided to intervene in the matter. In its statement, it called on the court to reconsider some of its decisions regarding the BP company, namely, to reduce the fine imposed on BP. And yet, the New Orleans court turned out to be inexorable and ruled that “the negligent or intentional actions of the British company led to the spill of 5 million barrels of oil in the Gulf,” which means that liability for such actions should be maximum.

Civil protest in GRAND ISLE, LOUISIANA. A symbolic “cemetery” dedicated to the species of flora and fauna that died as a result of the oil spill.
Photo: Katherine Welles

$13.7 billion is the price that the court ordered BP to pay for the lives of 11 people killed in the accident, for the largest environmental disaster in human history and for the enormous material damage suffered by businessmen and individuals.

Kristina Kuznetsova

On December 18, 2011, the Kola drilling platform, on which 67 people were on board, sank while being towed in the Sea of ​​Okhotsk. Only 14 were saved. Drilling and oil platforms are quite complex engineering structures that are constantly exposed to various types of risks - from natural disasters to operational errors. Gas and oil production on the sea shelf is inevitably accompanied by various types of accidents. There are many reasons for such disasters. These are storms, hurricanes, emergency explosions, fires, personnel errors, equipment breakdowns. Each individual accident unfolds according to its own scenario. Vesti.Ru recalls the seven most severe accidents.

"Kola"

Towing of the Kola from the western coast of Kamchatka to Sakhalin began on December 11, 2011. There were 67 people on board. Five days later, the caravan in the Sea of ​​Okhotsk found itself in a line of storms. The nose gear fairing on the platform was torn off, the hull skin was damaged, and a list formed. On December 18, the captain sent a distress signal. Only 14 people were rescued from the water alive. The bodies of 17 dead were recovered from the water. The remaining 36 are considered missing.

"Bohai-II"

On November 25, 1979, while being towed in the open sea, the Chinese drilling platform Bohai II encountered a force 10 storm. As a result of flooding in the pumping room, the platform overturned and sank. 72 people died.

Alexander Keilland

In March 1980, the Norwegian drilling platform Alexander Keilland broke apart and capsized in the North Sea. Of the 212 people on the platform, 123 died. Experts said the cause of the disaster was “metal fatigue.”

Ocean Ranger

In September 1982, the American oil drilling platform Ocean Ranger capsized and sank off the coast of Canada. The reason is an unprecedented hurricane. The impact of 15-meter waves broke windows and flooded living quarters. An ultra-reliable reinforced concrete structure weighing tens of thousands of tons, semi-submerged in the ocean, which was considered absolutely unsinkable, received a dangerous list. There were 84 people on the platform. No one managed to escape; after ten days of searching, the bodies of only 22 dead were found.

Piper Alpha

In July 1988, not far from England, the largest disaster in history occurred - on Occidental Petroleum's Piper Alpha oil production platform, as a result of an explosion that followed a gas leak, 167 people out of 226 on the platform at that time were killed, only 59 survived. Piper Alpha is the only platform in the world that has completely burned down.

R-56 Petrobras

On March 16, 2001, the P-56, the largest oil platform in the world, owned by Petrobras, exploded off the coast of Brazil. 10 oil workers were killed. On March 20, after a series of destructive explosions, the platform sank, causing irreparable damage to the environment.

Deepwater Horizon

The largest global environmental disaster to date is recognized as the accident on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform, which occurred on April 20, 2010, 80 km off the coast of Louisiana in the Gulf of Mexico at the BP field. During the explosion and fire on the platform, 11 people were killed and 17 injured. During 152 days of fighting the consequences of the accident, about 5 million barrels of oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico, the oil slick reached 75 thousand square kilometers.

If the situation had not been brought under control, the scale of the consequences could have been catastrophic, if not for the whole world, then at least for the entire Atlantic Ocean.

An explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico that occurred on April 20 of this year. The resulting leak was stopped only on August 4, when 4.9 million barrels of oil had already spilled into the waters of the gulf.

For a long time we ignored the events in the Gulf of Mexico and there were reasons for this - the difficulty in understanding the true causes of the disaster. Was the reason man-made or human carelessness? Or maybe there was a natural factor hidden under the water? It was not clear to us and we decided to wait.

But events developed and new interesting facts and questions emerged. The Deepwater Horizon disaster was followed by other less noisy accidents that quickly appeared and disappeared in the abyss of information.

The actual reasons are unlikely to be made public, although BP recently (8 September) stated that they found out the cause of the explosion and flooding of the platform - all the blame is shifted to human and technological factors, and design errors.

Although, let's look at the events that followed after Deepwater Horizon disasters.

An oil leak near an emergency well has natural causes

An oil leak recorded in the Gulf of Mexico has natural causes and is not related to the emergency well where the plug was installed, the agency reported on Monday, citing representatives of the BP company.

A new plug was installed a week ago to replace the previous one, which did not cope with its task of retaining oil and was removed from the well on July 10. During this time, approximately 120 thousand barrels of oil could have spilled into the gulf. BP specialists stated on July 16 that since the April accident.

However, earlier on Monday, the head of emergency rescue operations at the accident site, Admiral Ted Allen, in a letter to BP, reported “unidentified anomalies in the functioning of the plug.”

According to experts, the leak is located at a distance three kilometers from the emergency well.

After analyzing the situation, BP stated that at this time oil would come to the surface not connected with an emergency well.

“Scientists have concluded that this oil seepage is caused by natural causes,” BP spokesman Mark Proegler told the agency.

The BP-operated Deepwater Horizon rig sank in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Louisiana on April 22 after a 36-hour fire that followed a massive explosion that killed 11 people. , which began next and continues to this day, has already caused damage to the American states of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida and Texas and threatens the region with an environmental disaster.

The Gulf of Mexico incident was the largest oil spill in the United States since the Exxon Valdez tanker sank off the coast of Alaska in 1989. Then about 260 thousand barrels of oil spilled from the stranded ship.

The costs of the British oil company BP to eliminate the consequences of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico are already. This amount includes the cost of cleaning up the spill, the cost of building additional relief wells, sealing the well, grants to riparian countries and claims payments. The company has already received at least 116 thousand claims from victims, and 67.5 thousand of them have received payments worth $207 million.

Oil leaking from cracks in the seabed

The outbursts start at 20 seconds into the video.

Well geology and why everything is so bad

From the source you can see the sequential illustrated stages.
It should be noted that this is just a version trying to explain the origin of natural oil emissions from cracks in the seabed.

A gas production platform sank off the coast of Venezuela

may 13 2010. The Aban Pearl gas production platform sank off the coast of Venezuela in the Caribbean Sea; none of the 95 workers were injured, RIA Novosti reports citing the local newspaper El Universal.

The incident occurred in the state of Sucre in the northeast of the country. “You know, this is a floating platform. At midnight she bent down and scooped up some water. All work was suspended and evacuation was carried out,” President Hugo Chavez wrote on his Twitter blog. The head of Venezuela also noted that two patrol vessels of the country’s Navy headed to the platform. At the same time, he stated that the accident is not a reason to deprive the mining company Pdvsa of the right to explore and develop gas fields in the coastal waters of Venezuela.

Venezuelan Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez ruled out the possibility of gas leaks from wells that were drilled from the platform. However, he confirmed that the flooding of the platform does not pose a threat to the seabed.

Chavez opened his blog on the social service Twitter on April 27. Then he said that he decided to register on the site in order to combat the opposition, which is actively using the platform.

Let us remind you that on April 20, an explosion occurred on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico. As a result of the disaster, 11 people died. When flooded, the platform damaged the well, from which oil began to flow. By May 4, the oil slick reached the coast of Louisiana.

An interesting event in Arkansas stands out as a separate issue. in close proximity to the Gulf of Mexico.

June 14. The river overflowing its banks was accompanied by 7.5-meter tidal waves, which completely wiped out the recreation centers located along the banks of the river. Rescuers are still making desperate attempts to find the ten missing people. For this, all possible means are used: kayaks, ATVs and mounted patrols.

New spill in the Gulf of Mexico

July 28th2010 . Another oil leak has occurred in the Gulf of Mexico. True, this time not because of the BP drilling platform, but because of an old tugboat and an abandoned oil platform.

The incident occurred in Louisiana near the site where oil spill cleanup efforts have been ongoing for the past three months. On Mud Lake, a tugboat crashed into production equipment at a well owned by Cedyco Corporation, headquartered in Houston. This time, a strip of oil film formed on the surface of the water, the width of which is 50 m and the length is 2 km. The ship's captain stated that the well was not sufficiently illuminated, as required by the rules. Work is currently underway to eliminate the consequences of the accident. Special barriers have already been installed to prevent the oil slick from growing and spreading. The amount of “black gold” that leaked from the well is still unknown.

According to US authorities, it does not yet make sense to compare the damage from this accident with the one that took place at the end of April. The incident is local in nature. Let us recall that on April 20, 2010, an accident occurred at a well owned by the BP corporation. Then, according to various sources, from 354 million to 698 million tons of oil fell into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, which became the largest oil disaster in US history. As a result, the ecosystems of four states were damaged.

Meanwhile, the oil slick caused by BP is self-flooding in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. As Jane Lubchenko, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, recently reported, “it is becoming increasingly difficult to find oil on the surface of the water.” According to her, large amounts of oil were dispersed on the surface of the ocean and then absorbed by bacteria. The consequences of this have not yet been studied, so American authorities are afraid of the damage that will be caused to the environment.

The beaches of Goa began to flood with oil

September 2. Despite the promptly started work to purify the water off the coast of the most popular Indian resorts, thousands of oil balls are rapidly arriving. The situation is complicated by the fact that the location of the source of oil is still unknown, and the authorities were completely unprepared for such a problem. There is no special equipment; oil is collected along the shore by ordinary workers using brushes. What to prepare for those who planned to spend their holidays on the sandy beaches of Goa, Vesti FM radio learned from the executive director of the Association of Tour Operators of Russia Maya Lomidze.

Vesti FM: Good afternoon!

Lomidze: Hello!

“Vesti FM”: Is it known how much the beaches and the ocean were damaged?

Lomidze: According to the information we currently have, there are no oil spills recorded on the beach that our tourists traditionally choose, so our people are not returning from there yet. Nevertheless, there has already been a slight drop in interest in this region, and refusals have begun. True, they are isolated, but they exist.

“Vesti FM”: Here we can only hope that by this time the authorities will somehow be able to cope with the problem. Have you tried to find out any versions of what is happening? Where could oil come from on sandy beaches?

Lomidze: The country is quite specific, and information is difficult there. We have no information about where the leak occurred and for what reason.

Vesti FM: Experts believe that the oil plume may be coming from a tanker that has leaked. The oil could go to depth, and in the future it could be washed up off the coast.

Lomidze: Theoretically, this is possible, but there was no information anywhere in the media. And we also don’t know that some tanker had a leak.