Top Kill Likely a Failure

It's become obvious from BP's doublespeak and moving of the goalposts that the "top kill" hasn't worked. I'm beginning to believe exactly that; that BP knows the top kill has failed, but that they are continuing to pump mud out on the ocean floor rather than admit it. Typically, you know pretty quickly if a top kill works. BP has been pumping the kill since Wednesday, trying a number of tactics, including junk shots. Their announcement last night that it would be at least through the weekend before they know the results of the kill doesn't ring true to me. Certainly they know a lot more than what they are saying.

Recall that a top kill will work only if enough back pressure can be generated in the leaking wellhead to allow the pumped mud to overcome the pressure from the well, turn the flow around, and then build enough hydrostatic head to overcome the formation pressure. The junk shot was designed to do just that, but apparently BP had decided to try just mud for the first effort. I believe that the high rate that BP pumped the mud washed out the cracks in the riser, actually reducing back pressure. The cracks in the riser are where you saw the mud flowing if you watched the live feed of the top kill the last couple of days. As a side note, I do find it interesting that the BP feed no longer includes the bent riser view of the last couple of days,and now looks like the end of the riser where the riser insertion tool had been used previously.

The because of the washed out riser cracks, the bridging material pumped in for the junk shot probably can't clog up the riser and BOP enough to overcome the flowing pressure and allow mud to go down the well, so the mud they are pumping is likely just going into the kill and chokes valves and coming out the top of the BOP. That's not all bad, of course, if the pressure of the mud is at least restricting the flow of oil from the well, but it is certainly not a long term solution, and they are risking washing out the riser even further.

I'm now hearing that BP determined the top kill failure sometime in the last 24 hours, but rather than announce it, have decided to just keep pumping until the next alternative is decided, either the LMRP (lower marine riser cap) cap to bring flow to the surface, or removing the LMRP and landing a new BOP on top of the failed one.

I'll continue to monitor this recent development, but I'm not expecting good news in the near term.

 

 

 

Follow Robert L. Cavnar on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@dailyhurricane

Comments

[Uncle Brud]

08:55 PM on 06/01/2010

How useful would it be to start sucking on the top kill feeds, both before and during the cut and cap operation?

[Angiefranci]

04:29 AM on 05/30/2010

OK, we have NASA for space missions, but what is the name of the department that oversees ocean floor exploration? Can we not deploy some kid of underwater craft down to the depths to fix this pipe? Take it out of BP's hands completely and then have them foot the bill? And this cannot wait another two months or we'll all be swimming in slime. It's truly like the Dr. Suess story, Bartholomew and the Oobleck. Snow and rain were not enough, we must have some brand new stuff: the sea and fish were not enough we must add some other stuff. Sure is going to be yucky!

[Jond0]

01:29 PM on 05/30/2010

We know more about the moon than we do about our oceans.

[Alexander Higgins]

09:07 PM on 05/29/2010

Of course top kill failed with all of the explosion happening on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico

The where going on all day yesterday...
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/05/28/breaking-news-bp-dismantling-gulf-oil-spill-bop/

And have continued all day today
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/05/29/junk-shot-explosions-continue-bp-set-officially-announce-top-kill-fails/

Now that BP officially announces Top kill fails (36 hours later) what's BP's new plan?

Let it leak until August.

http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/05/29/bps-lmrp-leaves-gulf-oil-spill-leaking-august/

The government needs to step in here and try another option besides LMRP that involves actually capping the leak instead of letting this thing leak until August.

The LMRP option is nothing more than a glorified siphon.

[Troubledwawa]

07:19 PM on 05/29/2010

A repost from msjimmied. Watch the video - the Russians succesfully nuked an out of control well.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
msjimmied 5 hours ago (2:17 PM) 189 Fans Become a fan Unfan
Interesting how the Russians used nukes to close a well. Here it is in living color.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpPNQoTlacU
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[FREEDOM BELL]

05:57 PM on 05/29/2010

Oil spill briefing in a minute or two on CNN.

[FREEDOM BELL]

05:13 PM on 05/29/2010

The problem with this global economy is that no one cares about us. The big oil companies and oil nations who have the supertankers don't care about the gulf at all. That is why we don't have any supertankers. All they care about is money. Obama needs to get some one way or another. Our gulf can't withstand another three or more months of spill and dispursants. We need supertankers and sand birms. Obama must make BP deliver them.

[Jond0]

01:29 PM on 05/30/2010

Save the MONEY!! Save the MONEY!!

[Wingit]

05:06 PM on 05/29/2010

Rachel Maddow states the problems with offshore drilling.......

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/ns/msnbc_tv-rachel_maddow_show/#37408577

[rich misty]

05:21 PM on 05/29/2010

I highly recommend Wingit's link. Blowouts offshore are a common and recurring problems, not isolated once in a lifetime events. Drilling underwater is NOT SAFE given our current state of the art technology, and the US States is not a leader in this field. Deregulation and greed caused this disaster... But even tightly regulated non-profit drilling can be disasterous with todays inadequate technology.

http://dailyhurricane.com/2010/05/from-drill-baby-drill-to-spill-baby-spill-now-what.html

[booki]

05:04 PM on 05/29/2010

40 days and 40 nights.....
my mother had an index card on her mirror....
"man can be defeated, yet not destroyed.....man can be destroyed yet not defeated."
Ernest Hemingway.......a man who loved the Sea.

i fear we are defeated.

[Angiefranci]

04:37 AM on 05/30/2010

But remember, we have defeated ourselves. This is something that remains a mystery to me, why man does not solve his problems until it is too late. Man seems to come up and put into practice plans that have only been thought half way through, then, only later, do they realize their errors. When one puts profit or other bad values before the right ones this is what happens. What comes around goes around. Read and study the Tao, it's all explained there:
When man interferes with the Tao,
the sky becomes filthy,
the earth becomes depleted,
the equilibrium crumbles,
creatures become extinct.

[Jond0]

01:30 PM on 05/30/2010

Some men see things before they are too late, and often they are ridiculed for it.

[rich misty]

04:58 PM on 05/29/2010

Everything is being thrown in.

http://www.necn.com/04/21/10/Coast-Guard-rescues-oil-rig-workers-afte/landing.html?blockID=220293&feedID=4215

The US Coast Guard ^

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126395032

The US Army ^

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/25/94821/national-guard-labors-to-protect.html

The National Guard ^

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/05/mission_impossible_obama_taps_crack_team_of_scient.php

Top engineers and physicists ^

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/05/05/ongoing-administration-wide-response-deepwater-bp-oil-spill

The President of the United States ^

If you have something more to add, either contact the White House or the Deep Horizon Response Center.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact

1-866-448-5816

[rollingrock]

04:57 PM on 05/29/2010

Candidate Obama in 2008: 'Offshore drilling will only worsen our addiction to oil and put off investments in clean energy.'

President Obama in 2010: 'Obama to Open Offshore Vast Areas to Oil Drilling for First Time'

www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/science/earth/31energy.html
----------
He was against drill baby drill before he was for it.

[rich misty]

05:01 PM on 05/29/2010

I would expect you to come down and play politics... But listen to what Conservatives said before the spill occurred:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2010/05/01/krauthammer_oil_spill_will_be_death_knell_of_drill_baby_drill.html

Charles Krauthammer on Fox News ^

"Behind Obama's rhetoric lie bans and leasing delays; soon to follow are burdensome regulations. Instead of drill, baby, drill, the more you look into this the more you realize it's stall, baby, stall."- Sarah Palin

http://mediamatters.org/research/201004300034

[rollingrock]

05:07 PM on 05/29/2010

You actually pay attention to Fox News and Sarah Palin?
How sad.

[Bright Creature]

04:46 PM on 05/29/2010

The sooner the Obama admin figures out that the gov needs to hold the reigns on this the better. This is just getting worse and if it doesn't qualify for a global emergency I don't know what would.

[terry63]

04:42 PM on 05/29/2010

Bobby Jindal is still waiting for the go ahead to build sand barriers to stop the oil flow into his marsh's. Not a word from Washington, Their not talking to him at all. The President did a fund raiser this week at J. Paul Getty's Estate, and now is on Vacation. Carville is about to Stroke out.

[rich misty]

04:45 PM on 05/29/2010

That is not true.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/25/94821/national-guard-labors-to-protect.html

The National Guard ^ is moving Jindal's sand

[HLL]

04:49 PM on 05/29/2010

I bow to you rich misty. You've been saying all along that only a relief well would stop this gushing oil but I held out hope that this would work. . . . . but now we know that only a relief well will work and that will take months. I'm so sad today for the Gulf of Mexico. She can't take us anymore, and she shouldn't have to. Lord, what a tragic day.

[TattereD]

09:47 PM on 05/29/2010

Unbelievable to see the National Guard with all the military attire on, along with a life jacket. 85% + humidity on top of 80 degree weather has to knock you down fast.

[FREEDOM BELL]

04:49 PM on 05/29/2010

If Obama does not want to commandeer supertankers or otherwise solve the gulf problem, he should stay in Chicago. No one would blame him for resigning. The job is no fun.

[FREEDOM BELL]

04:34 PM on 05/29/2010

Hofmeister, former CEO of Shell Oil has been telling everyone to use supertankers. He has been ignored. Wouldn't need dispursants if we had supertankers but we don't have any. Oil floats to the surface without dispursants.

Obama would have to commandeer a bunch of them. They are supposedly all loaded with oil and have been sitting somewhere for the last couple weeks waiting for the price of oil to rise before offloading their oil. Really!

Obama should get busy!!!

[mrJJ]

04:31 PM on 05/29/2010

Oil spill hearings: Deepwater Horizon rig's two senior officers now considered "parties of interest" in explosion investigation

By David Hammer, The Times-Picayune
May 29, 2010, 2:05PM

This is an update from the joint hearings of the U.S. Coast Guard and Minerals Management Service held in Kenner on Saturday into the explosion and fire aboard the Deepwater Horizon oil rig on April 20, which killed 11 workers and created the Gulf of Mexico oil spill currently fouling Louisiana's coast.

Capt. Hung Nguyen, chairman of the joint investigative panel, said that because of their "conduct" on the Deepwater Horizon, the rig's two senior officers, Capt. Curt Kuchta and Installation Manager Jimmy Harrell, are now considered "parties of interest" in the investigation.

The other parties of interest are BP, Transocean and several BP contractors, who have lawyers at the hearings to cross-examine witnesses.

Crane operator Micah Sandell:

The joint investigation hearings in Kenner have been dotted with vivid retellings of the harrowing and chaotic moments when the Deepwater Horizon exploded April 20.

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/oil_spill_hearings_2.html

[rich misty]

05:09 PM on 05/29/2010

Thank you JJ for the important update. We want to identify the "missing man"

http://dailyhurricane.com/2010/05/bp-exec-admits-to-senate-hearing-what-we-all-knew-anyway.html

There are 11 drilling floor workers missing and presumed dead. 9 Transocean workers, 2 MI Swaco mud engineers. There should have been a BP drilling floor manager listed here...

[HisPetGoat]

04:26 PM on 05/29/2010

I would suggest cutting away and removing the existing attachments to the drill pipe casing. Then surround the exposed drill pipe with a flanged concrete cylinder (I think one of sufficient dimensions is available "off-the-rack"). Fill the bottom of the cylinder with gravel. Add concrete to a level just below the end of the pipe and let it set to weight the cylinder and occlude the gap at the bottom. Attach a dome to the cylinder flange with an open valve. Close the valve.

[rich misty]

04:31 PM on 05/29/2010

1-866-448-5816

Deepwater Horizon Response Center

[LazarusTJFA]

04:40 PM on 05/29/2010

No insult intended. Do you have any idea what you are speaking about? If you do, why are they not doing it? What is the down side?

[HisPetGoat]

05:12 PM on 05/29/2010

I'm assuming the drill casing integrity is good.

[HisPetGoat]

05:13 PM on 05/29/2010

No, I have no idea what I'm talking about. I'm a theoretical physicist. ;)