Deepwater Horizon oil spill

The Deepwater Horizon on April 21

About

The 2010-04-20 Deepwater Horizon oil spill began on April 20, 2010, with a methane explosion that killed eleven crew on the Deepwater Horizon, an oil exploration rig operated by BP off the coast of Louisiana, and caused a blowout at the wellhead 1500m (almost a mile) below the surface. The rig continued to burn despite intensive fire-fighting, and sank two days later.

It is the worst US oil disaster in history, eclipsing even the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989.

Timeline

• 2009-09-21 NOAA urges cutbacks in the lease schedule for oil and gas drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf, citing ecological concerns
• 2010-01-14 two US Congressmen – Bart Stupak and Henry Waxman – send a letter to BPXE (BP's Alaskan exploration division) noting several safety concerns
• 2010-04-20 methane blowout causes explosion, killing crew and setting oil rig on fire; oil begins spilling
• 2010-04-22 oil rig sinks
• 2010-05-02 Transocean's Development Driller III starts drilling a relief well to reduce the flow from the blowout
• 2010-05-05 BP announces that the smallest of the three known leaks has been capped, allowing them to narrow their focus
• 2010-05-07/08 BP deploys a 125-tonne (280,000 lb) dome over the largest of the well leaks in an attempt to contain the spill, but it fails due to the formation of methane hydrate crystals (it's not clear from the available sources, but it sounds like the crystals were blocking the exit tube -- so the containment worked, but since they couldn't suck the oil out of the dome due to blockage, it rapidly overfilled the dome and resumed spilling)
• 2010-05-10 the EPA gives BP permission to use toxic dispersants to break up the oil. "The EPA said the effects of the chemicals were still widely unknown."
• 2010-05-11 BP lowers a smaller "top hat" containment dome to the seabed but not over the gusher; it is apparently a backup plan for the tube deployed 3 days later
• 2010-05-14 BP deploys a suction tube 6 inches in diameter in an attempt to siphon or vacuum up some of the oil from a leaking pipe before it can spread; the attempt fails, but BP says it will retry on the 15th

Links

Reference

• Wikipedia
• ProPublica

Related

• 2014/04/20 [L..T] [[2014/04/20/EPA Gives BP Get Out of Jail Free Card|]] "The EPA ruled that the corporation could start bidding on lucrative new oil leases in the Gulf of Mexico after having been suspended from doing any new business with the government ever since the accident. [..] That suspension was lifted on March 13 less than a week before the yearly government auction for drilling rights."
• 2010/07/05 [L..T] Sex, Lies and Oil Spills «A common spin in the right wing coverage of BP's oil spill is a gleeful suggestion that the gulf blowout is Obama's Katrina. .. In truth, culpability for the disaster can more accurately be laid at the Bush Administration's doorstep.»
• 2010/06/09 [L..T] Efforts to Limit the Flow of Spill News Journalists struggling to document the impact of the oil rig explosion have repeatedly found themselves turned away from public areas affected by the spill, and not only by BP and its contractors, but by local law enforcement, the Coast Guard and government officials.