BP Oil Well Finally Declared 'Dead'
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On Sunday, September 19th, BP announced that the leaking Macondo well was finally 'dead' - ending the five month nightmare that began with a horrific rig blast that killed eleven workers and spewed millions of gallons of toxic oil, into the Gulf of Mexico.
While everybody has been waiting for this final event, it was the first 85 days that were the most harrowing, when attempt after attempt to plug the leak, failed.
It was not until July 15th that BP finally met up with some success. Using a procedure known as 'static kill', engineers pumped hundreds of gallons of mud at slow speeds through a pipe right into the blowout preventer at the top of the well and finally, plugged the leak.
Now, they could focus on the permanent solution, which involved a multistep slower procedure, to ensure there were no setbacks. The first thing they did was re-enforce the temporary seal, in early August, by inserting an additional shot of cement and mud above the existing plug.
Once sealed, they replaced the old blowout preventer - the one that had failed and caused the explosion, with a new one.
After that, they began the more permanent work - that of drilling 18,000 feet below the ocean's surface to get to the annulus or outer rig of the oil well and try plug it with cement, so that it would never spew out even a drop of oil ever again.
While this may seem like an easy task, according to John Wright, the man who spearheaded the whole operation, it was one of the toughest jobs he has undertaken in his 25-year career of capping wells. The biggest problem was the depth of the well. He had never had to drill this far down and with no video and a very weak signal especially for the last 1,000 ft. it all boiled down to skill and a bit of luck to get him to the exact spot.
Thankfully, they succeeded and were able to put to rest what seemed like a never-ending nightmare - One that has cost billions of dollars and disrupted many lives. While there is still a lot of clean-up to be done and the residents of the area are a long way from returning to their normal lives, there is hope that things will return back to normal. With a lot of human effort and some help from nature, we hope that it will sooner than later.
sources: mobile.latimes.com, news.yahoo.com
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210 Comments
- ruiover 15 yearsWow this article really convinced me to clean up the world because one time the wolrd use to be a mejestic place,and now it is a place of technical refuge. I can't belive that they actual did it on the good side. But on the bad side look how much the pump leaked out.
- Amirover 15 yearsFinally they plugged the oil well. Now there is no danger to those sea animals. They deserve to live and survive like us humans. We aren't endangered and never have been. The same results should go for all the other animals.
- annastasiaover 15 yearsso why about five months after thats when they decide to make something called the static kill but anyway one problem of pollution solved bout 100 more around the world to go
- nia over 15 yearsIf it is not then how s it an effect how was it caused and will it effect animals it alredy and if not will it eventually and how and why i learned in this article that people used a prodecure called static kill and the enginers pumped alot of mud into a leak
- nia over 15 yearsi am thinking: is this a negative or positive thing? To like close a leak might be a positive thing.
- nia over 15 yearsWhat happened to the Macondo was very tragic and very sad. The thing I dont know is was this thing a animal, or how did it die, was it a volcano ? I think it was because I was told that it killed eleven workers and spewed alot of tonic oil into Gulf of Mexico
- Hiover 15 yearswonder how much spilled in the gulf
- chyenneover 15 yearsthis is a sad story. i am very sorry for the people who were killed and the families of those people. the interesting thing is that it went on for 5 months. i hope this never happens again.
- danaiover 15 yearsThis article was a sad one.Imagine all the fish that must of died.I am happy that they got that toxic oil out of the Gulf Of Mexico.I hope that it does not happen again.They must of paied a lot of money.I cant belive their was a explosion.
- josephover 15 yearsthis was a very sad story like you would think what will happen next at like every second of the story and u would think its mission imposible.you will also ask your self will the oil leak last for a long time? But it didnt and that was a relef.