Wednesday, September 14, 2011

BP, Transocean, Halliburton to Blame for Catastrophic Gulf Oil Spill

Federal report on deepwater spill blames .


The Wall Street Journal (9/14, Gold, Subscription Publication) reports that a federal report into the cause of last year's Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf will be released Wednesday, and it blames BP, the crew of the drilling rig owned by Transocean, and the cementing process used by Halliburton, in addition to offering 50 recommendations for changes to offshore drilling.

BP scientist suggests company ignored critical information before spill. The AP (9/14) reports that according to documents and interviews, "A BP scientist identified a previously unreported deposit of flammable gas that could have played a role in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, but the oil giant failed to divulge the finding to government investigators for as long as a year." BP petro-physicist Galina Skripnikova revealed this information in a deposition with attorneys two months ago, saying that she did not relay the new information to drilling engineers on the Deepwater Horizon to warn them to hold off proceeding with the well ceiling process, and suggesting that she assumed the information would be passed up the corporate chain.

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