E4
The BP Disaster
KLMNO Despite months of activity, the spill continues
The April 20 explosion and fire on the BP-licensed Transocean drilling rig Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 people and injured about 17. The oil rig sank 5,000 feet below the water’s surface. Oil continues to spew from the wellhead. What has happened since the event:
CONTAINMENT OPERATION
Boom More than 560 miles of containment boom are
deployed, start- ing in late April.
Robotic
vehicles try to activate blowout preventer.
Deepwater Horizon explosion
April 20 May
Containment dome After robotic submarines seal one of three leaks on the submerged well, BP lowers a 98-ton, four-story-tall containment chamber over the two other leaks. A buildup of crystallized gas forces engineers to move it away from the leaking pipe.
First relief well started.
Siphoning tube BP engineers put a riser insertion tube into a leaking pipe and begin siphoning some of the oil to a drilling rig at the surface.
Second relief well started.
Chemical dispersants (applied both underwater and on surface to break up oil into tiny droplets) Boom (redirects or intercepts oil floating on the water’s surface)
Containment dome Riser insertion tube Top kill “Top hat” containment cap Q4000 rig New cap May
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
Oil washes ashore in Louisiana.
President Obama’s first visit to the gulf
Toxic, oily seawater washes ashore on the Chandeleur Islands off the Louisiana coast, a nesting and breeding area for many bird species.
Estimated gallons of oil leaking daily:
42,000 210,000
According to BP
According to the
U.S. Coast Guard
Two underwater plumes of oil reported by scientists.
Second visit
June
Third visit
Oil arrives on Alabama and Florida beaches.
Fourth visit
An accident disables BP’s oil cap, allowing oil to flow for hours.
July
Patches of thick oil wash ashore in Mississippi.
Tropical Storm Alex halts offshore skimming off Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.
Top kill maneuver Engineers attempt to pump dense drilling mud into the damaged blowout preventer to plug the well a mile below the surface. BP’s three-day effort, called “top kill,” fails.
June
Top hat A small containment dome, known as a “top hat,” covers the sawed-off pipe on top of the blown-out well to funnel oil to a ship on the surface.
Q4000 rig begins sucking up oil through lines hooked up to the blowout preventer and burning it. The top hat and Q4000 capture or burn about 1 million gallons of oil per day.
New cap is being lowered onto the blowout preventer in an attempt to stop the flow of oil into the gulf.
Relief wells Drilling of first relief well is close to completion, the best hope of finally killing the damaged well.
July July 13th
TUESDAY, JULY 13, 2010
500,000 to 800,000
According to the National Incident Command’s Flow Rate Technical Group
GOVERNMENT RESPONSE
April 27 Interior and Homeland Security
departments announce plans for a joint
investigation of the explosion and fire.
May 2 Fishing
restricted for at least 10 days in affected
waters from Louisiana to Florida.
May 8
A fishing ban for federal waters off the Gulf Coast is
extended to May 17.
May 12
Congressional hearing is told BP, Halliburton and Transocean ignored safety warnings in the hours before the explosion.
SOURCES: The Washington Post, Deepwater Horizon Unified Command, news services
May 13 Minerals
Management Service says new inspections of all gulf exploration drilling rigs to be completed within seven days.
840,000 to 1,680,000
Range of oil flowing from well, according to U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt
May 18 No-fishing zone is
doubled to 19 percent of gulf waters.
May 27 President Obama
announces six-month moratorium on exploratory deep-water drilling in Gulf of Mexico.
June 1
U.S. launches a criminal investigation into the oil spill.
1,470,000 to 2,520,000
Government estimate
June 16
Obama and top BP executives meet at White House; BP agrees to pay $20 billion into an escrow account to cover claims associated with the oil spill.
June 22
Federal judge in New Orleans blocks the six-month moratorium on drilling projects.
July 12 National
Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling holds first public meeting in New Orleans.
KATHRYN TOLBERT AND CRISTINA RIVERO/THE WASHINGTON POST
Tally measures the oil spill’s impact on wildlife
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inated with oil when it was spotted last month on Grand Terre Island in Louisi- ana’s Barataria Bay. The Unified Area Command keeps a tally of animals col- lected by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other authorities in the im- pact area of the Deepwater Horizon spill. The official causes of death or in- jury have not yet been determined. As of Monday the following animals had been collected: Live birds, visibly oiled: 1,085 Dead birds, visibly oiled: 654 Dead birds, no visible oil: 1,126 Live sea turtles, visibly oiled: 139 Dead sea turtles, visibly oiled: 14 Dead sea turtles, no visible oil: 82 Live mammals, visibly oiled: 2 Dead mammals, visibly oiled: 3 Dead mammals, no visible oil: 51
CAROL GUZY/THE WASHINGTON POST
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