Gulf Coast Oil Rig Explosion: What Could Have Caused The Explosion?
Following the explosion on the oil rig Deepwater Horizon 50 miles southeast of Louisiana’s coast Tuesday night, officials, crewmembers, and their families most likely have had serious questions about what could have ignited such an intense fire. At this point the cause is unknown and formal investigation will not be underway until rescue and firefighting efforts are completed.
The Times-Picayune reports:
The Coast Guard's Command Center in New Orleans received a report Tuesday about 10 p.m. that the rig was on fire and the crew was evacuating.
Luckily crewmembers perform safety exercises on a regular basis and are familiar with evacuation procedures. There were also several offshore supply boats in the area that provided assistance.
Just prior to the fire, the crew was cementing a production casing atop an 18,000 foot deep well. The plan was for the well to be abandoned and later tied into production facilities. This was done according to plan with appropriate testing completed and most likely was not to blame.
The Deepwater Horizon is owned by Transocean, Ltd., the world’s largest offshore drilling contractor. Transocean is a Swiss Company with offices in Houston. The rig has has been leased to BP Exploration Production Inc. who pay about $500,000 a day to use the huge 400 by 250 foot rig (roughly the size of two football fields). Last summer the Deepwater Horizon drilled the world’s deepest oil well, nearly six miles into the Gulf of Mexico, and enabled BP to find the Tiber Prospect, one of the largest petroleum discoveries in the US. While BP picks drilling locations for the Deep Horizon and designs the well, Transocean devises the drilling plan and operates the rig. The rig is only used for drilling and does not actually produce any oil.
Adrian Rose, vice president of Transocean, said the explosion appeared to be a blowout, in which natural gas or oil forces its way up a well pipe and smashes the equipment. But precisely what went wrong was under investigation.
Because Tuesdays explosion occurred in international waters, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will not be able to investigate. However, according to OSHA, Transocean has no safety violations for the past five years. BP on the other hand has two open and 27 closed cases. BP also operates the site of a 2005 refinery explosion in Texas City, Texas that killed 15 people and injured 170. That accident was investigated by the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board. According to Bloomberg News, the Board is considering investigating this rig incident as well.
After missing crewmembers are found and safely evacuated, the cause for the accident can be investigated thoroughly and the damage to the rig (whether it can be saved) properly assessed. The Deepwater Horizon was built in 2001 in South Korea. It cost about $350 million to build and has a replacement value between $500 and $600 million.
