Deepwater Horizon - Transocean Oil Rig Fire

[scotty50]

Look at the picture of the BOP a couple of pages back.
The sub sea shop was in the hull to the right.
There was a bunch of BOP test piping and other BOP related stuff on the deck where the guy with the blue hardhat is standing.

[anthracite]

Can anyone speculate on what they think was on the helideck that burned that rectangular hole? I noticed it on several of the photos of the rig before it capsized. Helicopter?

[userGOM]

Been told that was where the jet fuel 2 main storage tanks were...anyone confirm?

[Cajun90]

Since we have some sub sea and more drilling related folks joining, I'll ask this again: If the BOP on the rig floor becomes compromised - blown apart, wires shorted to lights and function buttons, does it compromise the other two? Also, where was the sub sea shop - BOP fluid pumps - in relation to the moon pool? I would think with most designs and the piping/wires that come out of there, it was located within one bulkhead of the moonpool.

No; compromising one panel would not compromise other panels. These systems utilize computer/PLC based systems that are coded communicaitons. They can't simple short out and cause a fault like you might have in a traditional electrical circuit. These systems are deisgned to to API standards and those standards dictate very clearly that a failure or fault in one remote panel cannot cause a failure or fault in another panel. Some systems on some of the old rigs could have this problem but not anything built in probably the past twenty years for deepwater. Not sure of the location of the main hydraulic unit aboard.

[kenimpzoom]

Thank god the winds and seas were calm which made the jobs easy for the rescue craft.

[pribas]

Can anyone speculate on what they think was on the helideck that burned that rectangular hole? I noticed it on several of the photos of the rig before it capsized. Helicopter?

My educated guess is that these holes on the helideck were caused by the fire underneath a aluminium Helideck. As aluminium has a lower melting point than steel it does not have the same fire resistance as steel. A strong fire melts it easily.

[rlanasa]

More early moment details:

Associated Press Reporting
Oleander Benton, a cook on an oil rig that exploded off the Louisiana coast, was sitting at a laundry room table with a friend when the lights went out. Then, there was the blast.

The Deepwater Horizon platform shuddered, debris fell from the ceiling and Benton hit the floor, as she had been trained to do. She scrambled through hallways littered with rubble, following a man in a white T-shirt.

"I could not see anything but that man. He just kept on saying 'Come this way, come that way.' It was like he was coaching me to my lifeboat, because I couldn't see," she said.

She made it across the sweltering, mud-caked deck to a lifeboat - one of 115 people to safely escape the platform after the explosion a week ago. Eleven others are missing and presumed dead.

Benton, 52, recalled her tale as crews used a remote sub to try to shut off an underwater oil well that's gushing 42,000 gallons a day from the site of the wrecked drilling platform. If crews cannot stop the leak quickly, they might need to drill another well to redirect the oil, a process that could take about two months while oil washes up along a broad stretch of shore, from the white-sand beaches of Florida's Panhandle to the swamps of Louisiana.

The oil, which could reach shore in as little as three days, is escaping from two leaks in a drilling pipe about 5,000 feet below the surface.

Nightmares have haunted Benton since the explosion April 20. She remembers following the man who knew his way around the platform, which is about the size of two football fields. She stumbled as he led her to the deck.

"Mud was everywhere ... This was mud that was shooting up from the well. It was oily mud, real oily," she said.

The fire made the already muggy night almost unbearable. Benton's name was checked off as she boarded a lifeboat, then there was a roll call to make sure everyone was accounted for.

"It looked like it was taking forever to get that boat in the water," she said, but "I think that's just because I was so anxious to go."

Benton didn't want to discuss her injuries, other than to say that she was bruised. Her attorney, Stephen Rue, said she was having trouble sleeping and is suffering symptoms of post traumatic stress syndrome. She has not yet filed a lawsuit in the case.

As of Tuesday morning, oil that leaked from the rig site was spread over an area about 48 miles long and 80 miles wide at its widest. The borders of the spill were uneven, making it difficult to calculate how many square miles are covered, Coast Guard Petty Officer Erik Swanson said.

"Right now, the weather's in our favor," Swanson said, explaining that the wind was blowing the oil away from shore Tuesday.

But Swanson said the winds could shift later in the week and there was concern about oil reaching the shore.

So far, skimming vessels had collected more than 48,000 gallons of oily water, Swanson said.

"Our goal is to fight this thing as far offshore as possible," he said.

The rig was owned by Transocean Ltd. and operated by BP PLC.

Crews used robot submarines to activate valves in hopes of stopping the leaks, but they may not know until Tuesday if that strategy will work. BP also mobilized two rigs to drill a relief well if needed. Such a well could help redirect the oil, though it could also take weeks to complete, especially at that depth.

BP plans to collect leaking oil on the ocean bottom by lowering a large dome to capture the oil and then pumping it through pipes and hoses into a vessel on the surface, said Doug Suttles, chief operating officer of BP Exploration and Production.

It could take up to a month to get the equipment in place.

"That system has been deployed in shallower water, but it has never been deployed at 5,000 feet of water, so we have to be careful," he said.

The spill, moving slowly north and spreading east and west, was about 30 miles from the Chandeleur Islands off the Louisiana coast. The Coast Guard said kinks in the pipe were helping stem the flow of oil.

From the air Monday afternoon, the oil spill reached as far as the eye could see. There was little evidence of a major cleanup, with only a handful of vessels near the site of the leak.

The oil sheen was a shiny light blue color, translucent and blending with the water, but a distinct edge between the oil slick and the sea could be seen for miles.

George Crozier, oceanographer and executive director at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab in Alabama, said he was studying wind and ocean currents driving the oil.

He said Pensacola, Fla., is probably the eastern edge of the threatened area, though no one really knows what the effects will be.

"We've never seen anything like this magnitude," he said. "The problems are going to be on the beaches themselves. That's where it will be really visible."

Concern Monday focused on the Chandeleur and Breton barrier islands in Louisiana, where thousands of birds are nesting.

"It's already a fragile system. It would be devastating to see anything happen to that system," said Mark Kulp, a University of New Orleans geologist.

Oil makes it difficult for birds to fly or float on the water's surface. Plant life can also suffer serious harm. Whales have been spotted near the oil spill, though they did not seem to be in any distress.

The spill also threatened oyster beds in Breton Sound on the eastern side of the Mississippi River. Harvesters could only watch and wait.

"That's our main oyster-producing area," said John Tesvich, a fourth-generation oyster farmer with Port Sulphur Fisheries Co. His company has about 4,000 acres of oyster grounds that could be affected if the spill worsens.

"Trying to move crops would be totally speculative," Tesvich said. "You wouldn't know where to move a crop. You might be moving a crop to a place that's even worse."

[pribas]

Obviously they're trying to close the shear rams to shear off the pipe and close the well. What are further options, sub sea persons, if a tool joint happens to be spaced out in the BOP at the shear ram?

The BOP shear rams are not designed to shear the drill pipe at the tool joint. They are designed & tested by shearing a drill pipe outside the tool joint. The regulations expect the operator to the know were the tool joint is and avoid the tool joint being stopped at the shear ram. This is how they are presently designed.

If the shear ram does not work as it should, as it looks like it was in this case, it could have anyhow damaged the drill pipe in the attempts they made to shear it. That is why in my educated guess I consider that they will not try to cap this drill pipe that is leaking the oil, as it my then start leaking somewhere else.

If this was the case, one solution is to:
a) come up with some kind of canopy to be placed on top of the open pipe end that is leaking to funnel the oil through a very long some hose to the surface were then it could be easily gathered;
b) have at least 2 other drill rigs drilling wells nearby to intercept this well to seal it. This takes about more than a month to be done and still they may miss the well, that is why you should consider doing it with 2 rigs at the same time, to increase the chances of success.

[tadwall]

No doubt all of you gents in the field already know this, but in the news today:

Diamond Offshore has ceased operations on and evacuated semi Ocean Endeavor due to the crude oil slick resulting from the destruction of Transocean semi Deepwater Horizon. The Ocean Endeavor was working with ExxonMobil in Mississippi Canyon Block 211, less than 10 miles from the Deepwater Horizon's last position in Mississippi Canyon Block 252. Evacuations on the Ocean Endeavor were completed on April 26 and the rig is now idle on location. A timetable for when the unit can resume drilling has not yet been established.

The Deepwater Horizon's Macondo well has created an oil slick of various levels of sheening, approximately 48 miles by 39 miles at its widest point, 30 miles off the coast of Venice, Louisiana.
26-Apr-2010

The Endeavor was working on some intervention / recompletion work on Exxon's block. Should be an interesting conversation with BP about who pays!

[slick]

"Mud was everywhere ... This was mud that was shooting up from the well. It was oily mud, real oily," she said.

I have seen umpteen dozen pictures of the life boats and saw no mud on them. May be wrong.

[rlanasa]

If they are taking all the other rigs offline in the area. How are they going to provide for relief drilling in the area?

No doubt all of you gents in the field already know this, but in the news today:

Diamond Offshore has ceased operations on and evacuated semi Ocean Endeavor due to the crude oil slick resulting from the destruction of Transocean semi Deepwater Horizon. The Ocean Endeavor was working with ExxonMobil in Mississippi Canyon Block 211, less than 10 miles from the Deepwater Horizon's last position in Mississippi Canyon Block 252. Evacuations on the Ocean Endeavor were completed on April 26 and the rig is now idle on location. A timetable for when the unit can resume drilling has not yet been established.

The Deepwater Horizon's Macondo well has created an oil slick of various levels of sheening, approximately 48 miles by 39 miles at its widest point, 30 miles off the coast of Venice, Louisiana.
26-Apr-2010

The Endeavor was working on some intervention / recompletion work on Exxon's block. Should be an interesting conversation with BP about who pays!

[tadwall]

"If they are taking all the other rigs offline in the area..." I don't know that they're doing that. This is more along the lines of suspending normal operations for a rig that is presently surrounded by an oily sheen (the Endeavor).

But that should not affect the relief drilling operations. Relief drilling operations are more of an emergency, a critical activity. I am guessing they will employ measures to protect the safety of the rig from floating hydrocarbons in the vicinity.

[Oil_and_Gas_person]

If they are taking all the other rigs offline in the area. How are they going to provide for relief drilling in the area?

The crew of the DDIII and Enterprise know that they are going into a hazard area.
This isn't Exxon's problem and I suspect that they DON'T want their crews working with hydrocarbons on the water (and especially so near the undersea wellhead.) Besides, it won't be Exxon paying for all that down-time.

[Oil_and_Gas_person]

a) come up with some kind of canopy to be placed on top of the open pipe end that is leaking to funnel the oil through a very long some hose to the surface were then it could be easily gathered;

Don't forget, it has been reported elsewhere that there is a second, stronger leak, coming from a mid-section of the riser (crimp, maybe?). This will be harder to successfully funnel to the surface. And at such depths and currents, oil that starts drifting upwards at point A, might break the surface all the way over at point Z.

[Allirog]

My thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones of those lost, to the men and women that escaped from this disaster and to all involved in the rescue operations that enabled 115 people to see their families again.
Having worked in marine, offshore and petrochemical environments my entire adult life, almost all of us have seen, or will see in our careers, something go badly wrong, resulting in a serious situation. Mercifully, very few of us will ever have to witness or experience anything of the same magnitude that the men and women aboard DWH did last week, off the coast of Rio in 2001, on Piper Alpha in 1987 or in Texas City refinery a few years ago. A message to those that managed to get off the rig, as the investigations get under way and criticism starts coming in from all side about who did this right and this wrong, only those few people who have been through a cataclysmic event like this are in any position to comment on your actions that night. God bless.

[Muttley]

A message to those that managed to get off the rig, as the investigations get under way and criticism starts coming in from all side about who did this right and this wrong, only those few people who have been through a cataclysmic event like this are in any position to comment on your actions that night. God bless.

It is about time some said this! Allirog you are absolutely 1000% right!

Ladies and Gent's as you get more attention from the press than you ever wanted. remember the men who didn't get off the Horizon. The ones that died instantly and the others who stayed at their posts trying to mitigate "the kick", not knowing the magnitude of the disaster upon them. Only those aboard can make any comment on your actions that night. That you got off the MODU at all with the overwhelming magnitude of the disaster is a excellent testament to the culture of safety and the MMS Award recently won the Deepwater Horizons crew. Don't accept any criticism from "armchair-quarterbacks" and professional (or amateur) critics. They can't go where you've been.

[RDD]

In the "sonar scan of the rig on the sea floor" Are we looking at the bottom of DWH as it's laying on its side?

Greetings all,

Here are some images from USCG's District 8 website. Link to info page is:
http://www.d8externalaffairs.com/go/site/2931/

We can see oil escaping what appears to be a section of drill pipe; I'll just note that it's not a full force, full bore, stream of fluid which implies some sort of flow restriction upstream of the flow point. Additionally, there appears to be shallow subsurface flow from a riser section below mudline. It's going to be a challenge to get this tidied up; there is a lot of mass in the loop of tubulars that must be in constant motion due to current activity.

Regards..


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[rlanasa]

http://gcaptain.com/forum/attachment...izon-fire-.jpg

Don't forget, it has been reported elsewhere that there is a second, stronger leak, coming from a mid-section of the riser (crimp, maybe?). This will be harder to successfully funnel to the surface. And at such depths and currents, oil that starts drifting upwards at point A, might break the surface all the way over at point Z.

You can follow this link to see a diagram of the kink and a photo of the flow from the riser kink,

[userGOM]

[QUOTE=pribas;31729]The BOP shear rams are not designed to shear the drill pipe at the tool joint. QUOTE]

No kidding, I"ve only assisted sub sea and changed about 20 sets, to include different ram sizes (that would be for different size drill pipe) and VBRs too. That section of pipe, that the shear rams shear, that would be called the tube. LIke the question said, what are options IF the tool jt is there.

[anchorman]

My thoughts and prayers go out to the loved ones of those lost, to the men and women that escaped from this disaster and to all involved in the rescue operations that enabled 115 people to see their families again.
Having worked in marine, offshore and petrochemical environments my entire adult life, almost all of us have seen, or will see in our careers, something go badly wrong, resulting in a serious situation. Mercifully, very few of us will ever have to witness or experience anything of the same magnitude that the men and women aboard DWH did last week, off the coast of Rio in 2001, on Piper Alpha in 1987 or in Texas City refinery a few years ago. A message to those that managed to get off the rig, as the investigations get under way and criticism starts coming in from all side about who did this right and this wrong, only those few people who have been through a cataclysmic event like this are in any position to comment on your actions that night. God bless.

That is very true. What is also very true is having a raised awareness by similar professionals because of this tragic event, and the open discussion about possible scenarios, serves food for thought and is not an open criticism by anyone's actions. Direct criticisms of anyone's actions on the DWH will not have a long life expectancy on this board. I'm sure that - well, I very positive that any oil field professional with drilling knowledge (myself not included), has thought, or has tried to think of what could have happened. Particularly guys sitting on live wells at this very second. This has effected the entire Gulf of Mexico and beyond. If anything is to be gained - that would be the knowledge of a similar event never happening again. Hopefully, an open discussion such as this is a very first step, and I doubt very seriously that a prerequisite of moving the discussion in that direction would be - to have been through something similar yourself. Allirog, everyone agrees with you 100% and those type of criticism that may come, will not originate from here.