BP Says "Top Kill" Operation Has Failed

MrShaggy sends a quote from a CBC story: "BP has scuttled the 'top kill' procedure of shooting heavy drilling mud into its blown-out oil well in the Gulf of Mexico after it failed to plug the leak. BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles told reporters on Saturday that over the last three days, the company has pumped more than 30,000 barrels of mud and other materials down the well but has not been able to stop the flow. 'These repeated pumping[s], we don't believe will likely achieve success, so at this point it's time to move to the next option,' Suttles said."

Comments

Amazing

[Anonymous Coward]

It's amazing that BP can drill for oil with no provable solution to a catastrophic failure. It's like operating on a patient and going 'Trust me, I'm a doctor'.

Re:Amazing

[Anonymous Coward]

Find a sufficiently desperate patient and promise to help him, then "trust me" might be all you need.

Re:Amazing

[Lumbre]

It's amazing that BP can drill for oil with no provable solution to a catastrophic failure. It's like operating on a patient and going 'Trust me, I'm a doctor'.

It's amazing that ANY corporation can drill for oil since NONE have stepped up to the plate with a viable solution.

Re:Amazing

[MrNaz]

Flamebait?

This is exactly what happened here. A government addicted to petroleum taxes as well as a band of politicians personally heavily invested in the oil industry makes for just such a desperate patient, who needs no assurance and asks no questions about the complex, expensive and dangerous procedures being conducted.

If the government was truly objective about its handling of industry, oil companies would have been required to demonstrate contingencies for all outcomes, including total catastrophic failure of equipment or processes. It's not like the industry operates on the knife's edge of profitability and can't afford to be held to account for their safety and recovery procedures; the oil industry has both the means and the funds necessary to keep such contingencies at the ready. However, they buy political apathy, and can put the money they would otherwise spend on safety into big bonuses for their directors and major stakeholders.

Fuck modern politics.

Re:Amazing

[kthreadd]

Instead of simply blaming governments and oil industries we have to think about our own desire to consume oil. Why don't we put more energy and effort into finding and using existing alternatives to oil? We, as consumers, have a responsibility in this situation as well.

Re:Amazing

[nacturation]

Instead of simply blaming governments and oil industries we have to think about our own desire to consume oil. We, as consumers, have a responsibility in this situation as well.

Let's say an apple farmer gives his apple pickers faulty ladders to work with and, as a result, dozens of workers every year fall and break their necks. Are you saying this would be the fault of consumers who purchase apples? Should people reduce their consumption of apples to fix this problem? Or does the fault lie with the farmer and have nothing at all to do with the people who purchase the apples?

Substitute farmer and apples with BP and oil.

Re:Amazing

[forand]

You have made quite a few assertions as to the viability of attempting such a maneuver, could you please provide evidence in the form of a well respected news article or scientific journal? As was noted by another poster the USSR often claimed things worked when they, in fact, did not.

It is also worth noting that your closing statement about Obama makes it appear that he is to blame for all of this, American Presidents, for decades, have been taking money from big oil who have demanded repayment in a variety of ways. This is not unique to the US and certainly not unique to Democrats or Republicans. Trying to make this out to be an issue about Obama alone is short sighted and politics at its worst.

WE have a environment catastrophe on OUR hands and working together is the only way to deal with it. Similarly the only way of ensuring something similar does not happen again is to demand of all of our politicians a break from the status quo.

Re:Amazing

[erroneus]

We don't "desire" to consume oil. We really and seriously don't.

I come from Texas where there is no mass transit to speak of. Before I moved to an area where there is popular mass transit, I would have completely agreed with you. But mass transit is POPULAR with the people here. You don't NEED to take a car everywhere to get by. Many shops are walking distance, the definition of which has increased since the move, and the rest of most destinations are available by train and bus. I don't spend what I used to on gas just going to and from work any more. I spend a fraction of that amount for commuting now.

When there are better alternatives made available, people will use them every time. It has been the auto industry and oil industry that protested the building of rails in most areas and they are still the parties resisting mass transit today. The masses of people who have never had an alternative to POV transportation might also get fooled into protesting mass transit on the grounds that more train and bus stops will provide increased inconvenience to drivers, but I have to say, that too is marginal. For those who have access to mass transit, they will most often report that they prefer it. For those who don't, it is hard to imagine any other way.

Re:Amazing

[IdolizingStewie]

As an employee of one of the companies you listed, do I think we would have handled the cleanup better, probably not. Do I think we would have had better preventative measures and emergency procedures to keep the situation from escalating to the current mess? Absolutely, beyond a shadow of a doubt. The accounts I have read of what was going on at the times surrounding the incident terrify me. Beyond even the engineering shortcuts taken, the idea that you need permission to hit the Emergency Shut Down was supposed to have died with the 167 men lost in the Piper Alpha disaster 22 years ago. If a lowly galley hand on my platform is the first to see a problem, I expect him to hit the ESD and then call the Control Room, not waste time runnning around in search of the only two people on the platform with the authority, who have to both agree to hit it.

Solution.

[Buzzsaw5]

Why don't they start pumping into the well all the bullshit they've been spouting for the last month. That should plug that sucker up real quick.

Falacy

[aepervius]

Firstly this is not the same domain of competence and risk, to drill an oil well thousand of feet deep, and to maintain a nuclear plant. Secondly nobody is trusting BP with a nuclear plant, but trusting other company. Finally there are many nuclear plant world wide maintained in a satisfactory state, and only a few major incident, none in the last 20 years with the latest design. There isn't many bulk way to generate energy for a baseline and/or peak electricity generation, fission, coal, gas, oil. Note on how 3 of those release carbon in the atmosphere which was trapped for a long time. Without going into global warming debate, nuclear plant are today the only baseline/peak generation which avoid that. Other generation method do exists, but the possibility are either exhausted (hydroelectric) are not compatible with baseline generation (wind, solar for example).

So carbon or nuclear, by govt or by private, TAKE YOUR POISON. The only real alternative is to go back to a pre-modern society.

Re:long history of cutting corners

[jpyeck]

Of-course this is just of top of the head and maybe stupid

^^ This ^^

30 years ago, drilling a well at this depth was not possible. Drilling technology has advanced to the point where drilling at this depth is now possible. Technology has also advanced to the point where the "same shit they tried 30 years ago" is even an available option at 5000+ ft down.

As an engineer, I take offense when people come up with stuff off the top of their head and assume that teams of professionals haven't considered the same options and rationally analyzed the feasibility.

I can assure you, all the crazy ideas you can possibly consider, and more, are being discussed among the engineers at BP who actually have experience in this industry. Yes, this spill is horrible. No, I can't believe BP doesn't want to have this fixed ASAP. The engineers on the front line simply don't have time to address the media, therefore you are left with execs so far removed from the actual work that they look like incompetent boobs