Yet Another Delay
Proving once again that they have no clue about the need for closure along the Gulf Coast, McClatchy reports on the latest delay: ‘Bottom kill’ of BP’s Gulf well now put off till after Labor Day
WASHINGTON — A relief well that government officials say will finally finish off BP’s Deepwater Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico won’t be completed until after Labor Day, weeks later than officials had been predicting.
The delay is necessary in part because officials want to preserve the blowout preventer currently sitting atop the BP well as possible evidence in federal investigations into what caused the well to explode on April 20, retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said Thursday. That means the old blowout preventer will have to be removed and a new one set in place before engineers can complete the relief well. That process and associated tests will take at least three weeks, Allen said.
“We do not want to have damage to the blowout preventer,” Allen said in explaining the delay. “We are concerned about preserving evidence.”
Look, that blowout preventer has been a vital piece of evidence since the explosion in April, and could have been swapped out any time after the success of the top kill was confirmed, but they waited until just before the relief well was finished.
The weather pattern that produced the Russian heat wave, Pakistani floods, and suppressed Atlantic tropical storm development is breaking down just as the most active portion of the hurricane season begins. It is almost as if they are trying for a new blowout, with delay after delay.
2 comments
I finally figured out the origin of the term “relief well”: “Jeez, it sure is a relief to have everyone’s attention turned elsewhere.”
Yeah, let’s ignore BP packing up and leaving, and just watch the action on the well head. I get PO’ed every time I see one of BP’s ads about “making things right”.