Oil Rig Survivor Blames BP For ‘Screwed-Up Plan’ That Lead to Gulf Disaster

Posted in BP British Petroleum,Deepwater Horizon,Transocean on September 16, 2010

WASHINGTON, DC – Oil rig survivor and Transocean employee, Buddy Trahan, a supervisor on the Deepwater Horizon when it exploded and caught fire on April 20, 2010, was severely injured in the disaster and blames BP for their “screwed-up plan” that lead to the blowout of the well and tragedy that followed.

Oil rig survivor blames BP and Halliburton for the Gulf of Mexico catastrophe.

Buddy Trahan, 43 years old, said that the crew and equipment on the Transocean Deepwater Horizon, which was leased by British Petroleum, were not at fault. Trahan visited the oil rig on April 20, 2010 along with BP executives and no one raised safety concerns. Just hours later, the well exploded, caught fire and almost killed him.

In an interview with Boomberg News, Trahan, along with his lawyer, tells his harrowing story to Megan Hughes. Trahan told Hughes of his many years of experience and his opinion as to who is at fault for the disaster. He blames BP and Haliburton, not the oil rig or its crew. Trahan is now suing both companies for negligence and “willful and outrageous conduct.”

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Trahan said to Hughes in the interview, “The more I learn about this well, the madder I get. It is pretty clear to me now it was a screwed-up plan.”

Trahan was lucky to survive the disaster. In the explosion he was hurled 30 feet through a wall, immediately burning the clothes off his back. Another worker pulled him from the rubble. Trahan suffered 12 broken bones and about 4 months after the disaster he was just beginning to walk again with the help of a walker.

Transocean, whom he did not sue, was paying his salary and his medical expenses. At the time of the interview around August 24, 2010, his salary and medical expenses amounted to more than $1.5 million.

Trahan’s reason for blaming BP was because of a flawed well design. He said they used foam cement in a high-pressure well instead of using a “safer, casing-type (of cement) or more centralizers and also failing to properly test the wall’s integrity.”

Trahan said that he has worked 23 years in this business on jobs for BP, Chevron and Shell Oil and has never seen this combination of bad choices.