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Posted in BP British Petroleum,Deepwater Horizon,Environment,Government,Jones Act,Louisiana Maritime News,Transocean,World Maritime News on September 7, 2010
NEW ORLEANS, LA – On Saturday, September 4, 2010, the blowout preventer from the Maconhttp://www.offshoreinjuries.com/blog/do well that was involved in the worst oil spill in U.S. history was raised from the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico by BP (British Petroleum) .
Blowout preventer hits the surface after 30 hours of painstaking work.
The disaster occurred in April, 2010 on the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling rig when the well blew out. The blowout caused an explosion and fire on the oil rig which killed 11 workers and caused the eventual sinking of the vessel and disastrous oil spill which followed. The Deepwater Horizon was being leased from Transocean by BP. The operation to retreive the blowout preventer was conducted by BP.
One of the key questions still remaining is, “Why did the blowout preventer fail?” Investigators also want to know the answer to this question so on the Helix Q-4000 vessel at the time the blowout preventer was raised, the FBI was there to take photos and video of the device.
The blowout preventer is a huge device. It stands about 5 stories tall and weighs over 300 tons. In the recovery operation, which took engineers nearly 30 hours, BP replaced the old blowout preventer on the well head with a new one. The recovered blowout preventer has been transported to a facility where it will be studied to determine why it failed.