Massive new oil sheen found in Gulf

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by BAT1, Mar 20, 2011.


  1. BAT1

    BAT1 Cowboys know no fear

  2. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    A few of observations here. First it's unlikely that this is oil. There are a lot of things that cause a "sheen" in ocean waters. But if it turns out to in fact be oil it may well be completely natural. Tens of thousands of gallons of oil seeps naturally up from the ocean floor in the Gulf every year. And oil washing ashore is not uncommon.

    If, and there are a lot of if's here, it is from some sort of leak or spill it is almost certainly not coming from the rig mentioned. Drilling operations don't spill oil unless there is an uncontrolled blow out that brings it to surface. You saw the results of that in the Deep Water Horizon. It is a dangerous and deadly situation that we train to prevent. If this rig was spewing oil there would be an all out evacuation going on and it wouldn't be a secret that some environmental reporter had to ferret out.

    Most drilling operations never know if they have "hit" oil or not. It never comes to the surface until the completion process after the well is drilled.
    Again, If, this is a spill of some sort it is most likely that it is coming from one of the many producing wells on the sea floor or the pipe lines that are carrying the oil to shore. The article says that this is a producing field that as been in operation for a decade.

    Lastly I would say to look at the source. The reporter is a greenie and certainly not objective. He would love to uncover a story about another "major" oil spill going on in the Gulf.

    "Judson Parker is the executive director of Save Our Shores! Florida, a statewide marine conservation organization, where he works tirelessly to defend the state's unique and beautiful marine environment. In the past, he has managed campaigns for Greenpeace USA and Environment America, and has extensive experience in grassroots organizing, lobbying, and environmental research."

    Of course I could be wrong but from what I know of the working of the oil industry it is highly likely that this story is no more than a Don Quixote reporter tilting at windmills. Looking for monsters under the bed.
     
  3. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    I always count on government conspiracy and plots to contaminate our environment in the attempt to increase profits monetarily and strategically. I can also count on the environmental nutjobs to cry "wolf!" at every instance regardless of factual data. In light of the recent BP disaster (see also purposeful explosion) which will continue to damage our environment for decades to come, it isn't too impossible to believe that some chemical or oil spill can remain.

    All things being equal, the right answer tends to be the simplest: Oil spill.

    But, we never held those accountable for the FIRST problem...what makes anybody think it will ever change?
     
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  4. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    I read many of the wild theories about how the DW Horizon was sabotage. A Korean sub torpedoed it, some al-queda planted explosives on it etc. That is similar to this story. People are so unfamiliar with the working of the drilling industry that they have no clue if something is possible or not.

    It is 100%, absolutely, impossible for any of those scenarios to have occurred. Oil is not present at the surface during a drilling operation. A torpedo might have sunk the rig but it could not have caused oil to flow uncontrolled from miles in the earth to the surface to spill into the ocean.
    Simply not possible. The oil and gas is held in the ground by the hydrostatic force of a column of fluid in the well bore. The only possible way to get the oil to rise to the surface is to remove that column of fluid.

    And that can only be done by the rig pumping it out. I have read all the reports on the accident and that is what the rig was doing at the time was displacing the column of heavy "mud" with sea water. Thinking that the oil and gas had been isolated with a mechanical barrier with cement on top of it. (17,000' below the oceans surface)There were several indications that something was wrong but unfortunately those indications were misinterpreted and it was assumed that the operation was proceeding as per plan.

    That was an accident pure and simple and there was nothing deliberate about it. No "purposeful explosion" . Simply not possible.

    Same with this. The simplest answer is the most logical. A natural occurrence. But one that people are hyper aware of because of the recent disaster. The news is reporting today that it is not oil. Scientists aren't 100% sure what it is yet, but say it is most likely some sort of plankton or algae.

    Latest from Fox


    The Coast Guard tested the patch Sunday and found only trace amounts of petroleum that were well below the state of Louisiana's standard for clean water. A news release says The Coast Guard believes the discoloration is the result of sediments brought down the Mississippi River.

    Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/03/21/coast-guard-gulf-substance-likely-sediment/#ixzz1HDbYr5Eo
     
  5. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    Claiming to have a superior knowledge as though the "serfs" are unworthy of standard reading and writing skills is an old tactic, one I am familiar with. One does not need to be a professional in the oil industry to witness conspiracy. One does not need to be a Harvard graduate to know that corporations have destroyed this nation for profit and plundered enough of the world's resources. I am all too familiar with the psychological tactics of the corporate media and the way they use "experts" to consistently drive their propaganda machine. Well, I am here to tell you that I am well aware of artificial scarcity (peak oil) and the role these corporations play. I'm not biting the hook.
    Most important links: BP Aware Of Cracks In Oil Well Two Months Before Explosion
    Attorney: Deepwater Horizon Managers Knew About Oil Rig Problem Before Explosion
    Evidence Points To BP Oil Spill False Flag
    Disaster capitalists: Halliburton to make money off oil spill
    The rest:
    The Spill, The Scandal and the President | Rolling Stone Politics
    BP Crop Dusting U.S. Population Under the Cover of Night :
    BP Crop Dusting U.S. Population Under the Cover of Night
    ExxonMobile/Shell/BP caught red handed in the GLOBAL WARMING SCAM!
    Climategate: the man-made global warming hoax
    Greg Palast on The Alex Jones Report
    False Flags enable Illegitimate Surveillance industry-Biometrics-Technocracy

    I have a copy of "The Grand Chessboard" in our download section for you to read at your own leisure. It will do you some good to come to terms with reality. ;)

    Before rig explosion, BP pumped chemical mixture into well, contractor says
    Obama’s Katrina? :: www.uruknet.info :: informazione dal medio oriente :: information from middle east :: [vs-5]


    Fine. If it is algae, all the better. It still doesn't change the fact that the oil cartels have nobody's best interests in mind but their own. One word: Corexit. If you want to be an Opec supporter, by all means...just don't spread crap around like it's algae and expect me to smile. ;)
    See, there's your problem right there.

    I know you are in the business, but that doesn't give you the right to take on a position of superiority, as though to say only those who work in the business ought to have a valid argument. I don't buy it. I know (see also "not guessing") that the BP oil spill, disaster, whatever you want to call it --was purposefully carried out. Now, who benefits from this? I linked the answer above. Have a nice day. :D
     
  6. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    Never said that. But if I had a problem with a car I would listen to a mechanic. I know what a fly wheel is and I know what it takes to remove one. But most people who have not been around it have no idea how the oil industry works. I call it the unknown profession. That doesn't reflect on the intelligence of the general population. Just because you haven't been exposed to something doesn't make you ignorant.

    And therein lies the problem. I read all your links and to someone who just happens to have spent their lives doing the very thing that is being discussed, it is readily and blatantly apparent how through innuendo and lack of understanding that false and ridiculous conclusions can be drawn.

    "The Mining and Mineral Services agency released documents to Bloomberg indicating that BP “was trying to seal cracks in the well about 40 miles (64 kilometers) off the Louisiana coast,” according to the report.

    The fissures, which BP began to attempt to fix on February 13, could have played a role in the disaster, though this is a question still being explored by investigators. Improperly sealed, the cracks cause explosive natural gas to rush up the shaft.

    “The company attempted a “cement squeeze,” which involves pumping cement to seal the fissures, according to a well activity report. Over the following week the company made repeated attempts to plug cracks that were draining expensive drilling fluid, known as “mud,” into the surrounding rocks,” states the report."

    This gives the impression that there were some kind of faults in the equipment that they were frantically trying to fix. This in fact is a normal and regular occurence in most wells drilled. And it is taking place hundreds or thousands of feet underground. Lost circulation is common when drilling a well. We drill through sand and rock formations and they are not always solid. You encounters fissures, even caverns sometimes. Drilling cannot continue until you re-establish circulation that brings the cuttings drilled back to the surface. You pump all kinds of "Lost Circulation Materials" down the hole to seal the fissures and if needed you pump cement to seal off the zone and continue operations. I have done this thousands of times and with no intention of blowing up a well!

    "As we highlighted last week, on page 37 of British Petroleum’s own investigative report into the oil spill, it is stated that the Hydraulic Control System on equipment designed to automatically seal the well in an emergency was modified without BP’s knowledge sometime before the explosion."

    Again a regular occurrence and nothing sinister about it. The "modifications" might simply be replacing a gasket in a connection or a rubber hose with a steel line. BPis notorious for their rigid safety procedures and if some minor repair was needed it is much easier to just do it than to go through the whole lengthy red tape process of getting the required forms, and permissions from the office. This sound more likely like BP scape goating and trying to shift blame to the drilling contractor. There is nothing sinister or conspiratorial here either.

    "On April 12th, just over one week before the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, Halliburton, the world’s second largest oilfield services corporation, surprised some by acquiring Boots & Coots, a relatively small but vastly experienced oil well control company."

    This is more evidence of looking for boogie men in all the wrong places. Halliburton owns a lot of companies. They are a mega conglomeration. Owing B & C could not in anyway benefit them if they allowed a BP well to blow out. The oil company owns the well and they hire the sub contractors to work on their well. Halliburton cementing was hired to do the cementing on the job. There is no guarantee that Boots and Coots would have been hired to fight the blow out. So there is no connection here to the cementing company on a blow out owning a blow out fighting company.

    "Halliburton was forced to admit in testimony at a congressional hearing last month that it carried out a cementing operation 20 hours before the Gulf of Mexico rig went up in flames. The lawsuits claim that four Halliburton workers stationed on the rig improperly capped the well."

    Forced to admit? If that isn't an attempt at media manipulation I don't know what is. The job they were dong was cementing in a liner. A job that is done on every well ever drilled. Forced to admit? Come on.

    They were finished drilling the well. They were preparing to move the drilling rig off the well so that a production platform could be raised above it and production operations could begin. They ran a "Liner" which is a large pipe that cases the well and seals off all of the open formations. it is set in place and a "Liner Hanger" is engaged that expands and seals the well off. Then as an added precaution cement is pumped on top of the liner hanger to insure there is no communication between the well pipe and the oil and gas producing formation. It is essentially sealed off, not capped. This is tested and when the rig crews are satisfied they begin the process of displacing the heavy "mud" out of the well pipe and replacing it with sea water. it was during this operation that something went wrong.
    It is still not known if the liner hanger allowed communication or the cement "channeled" and allowed the gas to enter into what was believed to be a sealed pipe. The well blew out and 11 oilfield workers lost their lives.

    That is the story and the whole story and to inanely insinuate that it was anything other than the terrible accident that it was is to dishonor the memory of those men, those fathers, brothers and husbands who lost their lives working in the 3rd most dangerous occupation there is to bring to the world the cheapest energy the world has ever known so that world can bitch every time the price of gas goes up 10 cents.

    There are enough boogie men in the world without making up false ones.

    Again, without sounding too superior. There is no way that the accident on the DW horizon was planned or perpetrated by some sinister shadowy "plan". And anybody gullible enough to believe it was is a fool.
     
    BTPost likes this.
  7. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    Then call me a "fool" for not believing an employee of the oil industry and choosing not to believe in the cartels and their government puppets.

    I've stated my case. There's no point in beating a dead horse.
     
  8. BAT1

    BAT1 Cowboys know no fear

    I'm thinking there's a huge fissure down there getting bigger, caused by drilling mistakes. Their coordinates might be messed up by Earth changes like magnetic shifts and actual pole shifts. The airports keep having to compensate for these changes. It could be part of the New Madrid fault line fracture. One thing is for sure it is not any members fault here. We just want to survive this mess.
    Our Monkeys in that area need to know what's happening out there. Bad year for sea life.
     
  9. Seawolf1090

    Seawolf1090 Retired Curmudgeonly IT Monkey Founding Member

    New Madrid fault is a thousand miles from the Gulf rigs.......

    Just sayin'........ ;)
     
  10. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    Thanks for the post Bat. I hope I didn't sound to you like I was trying to be "Superior". As I said in my post it was entirely possible that it could have been an oil spill and that would be bad news for a lot of people. I was only pointing out that it wasn't likely that it was coming from the drilling rig. And pointing out the obvious bias of the reporter.

    There are miles of pipe lines on the ocean floor carrying oil from offshore wells to land, and occasionally one springs a leak and have even been caught by boats anchors and damaged.

    Eternal vigilance is the price we have to pay for a continued supply of cheap energy. When that vigilance fails the blue collar rig pigs like myself and those 11 men on the DW horizon are the ones who pay the price. With our blood and sometimes our lives. The idea that we would, or would allow someone else to intentionally cause the greatest fear we as oil men face is insulting and plain stupid. The greatest man made dangers we face are engineers in an office who have "a great idea". Sometimes humans err, and sometimes equipment fails, and sometimes both happen at the same time, and men die.

    We battle the awesome force of mother nature everyday in our work, sometimes we lose.
     
  11. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    Oh my god, spare us with the hero role, please?

    You are a respected and fine member, MM. I apologize for rubbing your skin, but I can't believe for a second that you are all saints out there drilling for oil as the United States conquers nations for corporate profit. You may very well be an exception, but that doesn't mean every man out there on the rigs is just like you. It also doesn't mean that they are each infallible or incapable of being corrupted or bribed. And when it comes to making command level decisions, not every employee knows about them. If you had really taken the time to read the numerous links I posted, you would have found a clear pattern of deceit. Your bias runs just as deep as my contempt for the oligarchy. I am willing to drop it if you are, but if you want to have a pity party, this thread is only going to continue to degrade.

    Cheap energy? Give me a break.
     
  12. Conagher

    Conagher Dark Custom Rider Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    No, this thread will not continue to degrade!

    Healthy debates and conversation is fine, but don't make it personal and get into pissing matches to get others to see your point of view.
     
  13. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member

    Brokor, first off thank you for the apology and I apologize for calling you a fool. And I apologize to Bat1 for hi-jacking his thread.

    Ok. You claim to be a rational and intelligent person who sees through all the BS and all the manipulations and misguidance fed to the sheeple. Correct?

    But you are falling hook line and sinker for one of the biggest scams and myths there is.

    Who do you think makes up the "oil industry"? Who is it that you think are out there drilling the oil wells all over the world? It isn't JR Ewing. It isn't some fat cat oil baron. It's a dirty, grimy, physically demanding, dangerous job. There aren't any 6 or 7 figure roughnecks. 95% of the oil workers in the world are red necked, blue collared, beer drinking, deer hunting, good ole boys. The average salary is $60 to $80k a year. Not bad but certainly not the mega millions that most people think when you mention the "O" word. There are a few guys that put in a ton of overtime who might barely break that 6 figure mark, before taxes that is.

    To think that these average joes could in any way be responsible for anything except trying to make a paycheck is a fantasy. You were a soldier. Did you go to war to exploit the natural resources of Iraq? Did you as a soldier deliberately manipulate events so the world would support the military actions in Afghanistan? Come on guy, use your head. The men out on the rigs would kick the dog **** out(to use a roughneck term) of anyone who suggested they do something insanely dangerous that could kill everybody on the rig.

    I work for the largest oil company in the world and I could go up on the rig that I am sitting 100' from right now. And if I told the guys up there to start pumping all the mud out of the hole they would tell me to go straight to hell. Don't pass go, don't collect $200, and if I tried to do it myself they would see that I got there.

    And I did read the links you posted and I saw nothing but the smoke and mirrors that you see everywhere else. A great deal of misunderstanding and a little innuendo and a lot of false assumptions.

    And excuse me if I get irritated when these men who leave their families and travel to all the shitholes of the world to make that extravagant salary and risk their lives in one of the most dangerous professions there is to provide the life blood that has allowed mankind to achieve the greatest level of luxury and prosperity that any human beings have ever known, get accused of being shills for some "big oil" plot or scheme, or that they deliberately killed 11 of their coworkers for the greed of the oil company, or that they are intentionally hiding all of that oil to drive the price up, or any other hair brained idiotic fantasy that Alex Jones can dream up.

    Excuse me if I think that they deserve a little bit of appreciation for their sacrifice.

    Corporate greed is one thing but the man in the field is not responsible for it. The soldier isn't out to promote some political agenda. And the oil worker isn't out to drive up the price of oil. And they could care less about the oil company. The vast majority of workers work for a contractor that hires out to all the oil companies. I have over 70 people on my job right now, you know how many are oil company employees? Just me. 1 out of 70. You think they give a rats ass about my companies profits or bottom line? They are here to make a paycheck and go back to their families.
    And I've had two of them so far that didn't make it back to their families. And they didn't give their lives to make some oil company richer I guarantee you.
     
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  14. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    I will say this and end it here. Follow the money. If you can't do that, to hell with ya. ;)

    Thanks for taking sides, Conagher. I am especially aware of how I failed to "tone it down" with my apologies and attempt to compromise.

    Take care.
     
  15. Conagher

    Conagher Dark Custom Rider Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Brokor,

    I wasn't taking sides, I just missed the spot where you apologized to MM, so in that, I'm sorry if it seemed as if I was taking sides in the discussion.
     
    Brokor likes this.
  16. Minuteman

    Minuteman Chaplain Moderator Founding Member


    NEW ORLEANS — An oil company has come forward to say it may be responsible for an oily sheen across 30 miles of waters off Grand Isle, La., saying it was surprised since it only reported a few gallons of spilled crude, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reported Wednesday.

    Anglo-Suisse Offshore Partners, based in Houston, acknowledged it was told by the Coast Guard that it may be responsible, the Times-Picayune stated.

    The well was nonproducing and was being capped when the accident happened, the company said, adding that it estimated fewer than five gallons had spilled.

    State crews earlier came across workers trying to cap the well with a remotely operated submarine.

    The company said the well was completely shut down Tuesday night.

    Oil company tied to sheen off La. - US news - Environment - msnbc.com



    It has to be noted here that EPA regulations only require spills in excess of 1000 gallons for a one time incident and 42 gallons for a 2 incidents within a 12 month period have to be reported. If this company knew that they had discharged in excess of that and not reported it accurately then they will be subject to heavy fines. But if it is found that they were within the regulations they will not be fined but may be charged for the clean up.

    This is from the EPA guidelines;

    "A harmful quantity is any quantity of discharged oil that violates state water quality standards, causes a film or sheen on the water’s surface, or leaves sludge or emulsion beneath the surface. For this reason, the Discharge of Oil regulation is commonly known as the “sheen” rule. Note that a floating sheen alone is not the only quantity that triggers the reporting requirements

    A discharge must be reported to the EPA Regional Administrator (RA) when there is a discharge of:
    More than 1,000 U.S. gallons of oil in a single discharge to navigable waters or adjoining shorelines

    More than 42 U.S. gallons of oil in each of two discharges to navigable waters or adjoining shorelines occurring within any twelve-month period

    When determining the applicability of this SPCC reporting requirement, the gallon amount(s) specified (either 1,000 or 42) refers to the amount of oil that actually reaches navigable waters or adjoining shorelines, not the total amount of oil spilled. "
     
  17. Brokor

    Brokor Live Free or Cry Moderator Site Supporter+++ Founding Member

    BP Slick: Officials remain baffled over source of oil slick as Louisiana coastline is oiled again
     
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