The rig represents the cutting edge of drilling technology. It is a floating rig, capable of working in up to 10,000 ft water depth. The rig is not moored; It does not use anchors because it would be too costly and too heavy to suspend this mooring load from the floating structure. Rather, a triply-redundant computer system uses satellite positioning to control powerful thrusters that keep the rig on station within a few feet of its intended location, at all times. This is called Dynamic Positioning. The rig had apparently just finished cementing steel casing in place at depths exceeding 18,000 ft. The next operation was to suspend the well so that the rig could move to its next drilling location, the idea being that a rig would return to this well later in order to complete the work necessary to bring the well into production. It is thought that somehow formation fluids – oil /gas – got into the wellbore and were undetected until it was too late to take action.

With a floating drilling rig setup, because it moves with the waves, currents, and winds, all of the main pressure control equipment sits on the seabed – the uppermost unmoving point in the well. This pressure control equipment – the Blowout Preventers, or ‘BOP’s” as they’re called, are controlled with redundant systems from the rig. In the event of a serious emergency, there are multiple Panic Buttons to hit, and even fail-safe Deadman systems that should be automatically engaged when something of this proportion breaks out.

None of them were aparently activated, suggesting that the blowout was especially swift to escalate at the surface. The flames were visible up to about 35 miles away. Not the glow – the flames. They were 200 – 300 ft high. All of this will be investigated and it will be some months before all of the particulars are known. For now, it is enough to say that this marvel of modern technology, which had been operating with an excellent safety record, has burned up and sunk taking souls with it.

The well still is apparently flowing oil, which is appearing at the surface as a slick. They have been working with remotely operated vehicles, or ROV’s which are essentially tethered miniature submarines with manipulator arms and other equipment that can perform work underwater while the operator sits on a vessel. These are what were used to explore the Titanic, among other things. Every floating rig has one on board and they are in constant use. In this case, they are deploying ROV’s from dedicated service vessels. They have been trying to close the well in using a specialized port on the BOP’s and a pumping arrangement on their ROV’s. They have been unsuccessful so far.

Specialized pollution control vessels have been scrambled to start working the spill, skimming the oil up. In the coming weeks they will move in at least one other rig to drill a fresh well that will intersect the blowing one at its pay zone. They will use technology that is capable of drilling from a floating rig, over 3 miles deep to an exact specific point in the earth – with a target radius of just a few feet plus or minus. Once they intersect their target, a heavy fluid will be pumped that exceeds the formation’s pressure, thus causing the flow to cease and rendering the well safe at last. It will take at least a couple of months to get this done, bringing all available technology to bear. It will be an ecological disaster if the well flows all of the while; Optimistically, it could bridge off downhole.

It’s a sad day when something like this happens to any rig, but even more so when it happens to something on the cutting edge of our capabilities. The photos that follow show the progression of events over the 36 hours from catching fire to sinking.

Click on any of the images below to be taken to the Flick’r image gallery where they are located.

Can You Hear It?

Sometimes it presents such beauty
as to bring a tear to one’s eye,
or innumerable horrors that chill
to the very marrow,
a sense of wonder beyond wonder
as though everything were redefined,
and sadness, so deep that aching is not enough,
so that even death, itself, could not end it.

Stand tall and fearless, you, so fragile and full of life,
and when The World tells it’s true name
don’t you dare fucking blink.

LD November 2007

I love that. I also love what it says about him on his profile:

Lord David was born feet first with teeth, stolen by Gypsies & raised by Pirates. After being captured by The Evil One during the War with the Giant Rats of Sumatra, Lord David escaped by drawing a window seat third class bus ticket to Cleveland on a cereal box top, and jumped ship in New Orleans. Scoundrel, artist, bartender, hot shot guitar player, ex-punk & rock singer, late night pub philosopher, general layabout & vagabond, he can be found doing whatever pays or entertains. He is also the founder & host of the Skull Club.

KOC_Loki

Originally uploaded by chinagrrrl

Guys. I will be watching over y’all today like a Holy Guardian Angel. I expect you to do this Mardi Gras thing right! Call me from the steps…

I love you!
Chinagrrrl

Cafe DuMorning!!!

Originally uploaded by chinagrrrl

Cafe Du Monde is on Jackson Square in NOLA. I found a place to but cans of their coffee here in Akron, OH. I am much pleased. That is all.

Child watches parents’ shooting in eastern New Orleans

by Brendan McCarthy, The Times-Picayune  

Wednesday December 03, 2008, 10:46 PM

For more than 12 years, he and she were a couple. They bore a child. They fought, they shared, they battled through his stints of depression and brief jail time.

Early Wednesday, their last fight started with harsh words and escalated into a slap across her face. Then gunshots.

As their 8-year-old child watched, Osborne “Ronnie” Surtain, 38, shot his longtime girlfriend, Jacquekeia Muse, before dashing outside their eastern New Orleans home and shooting himself once in the head, authorities and family members said.

They were rushed to University Hospital. He died Wednesday at midday. She clung to life in critical condition.

Between soft sobs, Surtain’s mother, Gail, said on the telephone that her son was suffering through a bout of “great depression.” Muse was trying to help him.

But shortly after midnight Wednesday, he kicked in the door, according to a New Orleans police log.

“Something clicked, ” Gail Surtain said. “He wanted to die. He wanted her to die with him.” The grieving grandmother spent most of the day at the hospital, overwhelmed with the situation and despondent over the damage done to her 8-year-old grandson.

His parents’ last moments together unfolded in front of him. He told his grandmother everything that happened, including how he “tried to fight the gun out of his daddy’s hand, ” Surtain said.

The couple first met at a party about 13 years ago.

“I was glad they were together, ” Surtain said. “She was a sweet, wonderful woman. She was a part of him. And I knew he loved her, I can say that as a fact.”

Muse worked at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in eastern New Orleans, Surtain said. Her family could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Ronnie Surtain worked odd jobs, mostly in construction. He had a minor criminal record. Surtain pleaded guilty in 2003 to possession of crack and heroin and was given a suspended sentence, with credit for time served.

It’s unclear where the gun came from and how it ended up in their home, in 5800 block of West Deer Park Boulevard.

Nonetheless, he pulled the trigger and ended his life, destroyed her life, and ruined their life together.

. . . . . . .

Brendan McCarthy can be reached at bmccarthy@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3301.

Today I encountered this:

Pirate Cannon – A working replica of a naval cannon that fires pneumatically

Halloween has been a pirate theme around here for a while. I had the sword, I had the treasure chest, I needed a cannon. More than just a prop, this cannon will fire a potato slug a couple of hundred yards. For Halloween we dialed back the psi and shot harmless “cannonballs” made from tissue paper filled with baby powder. The result was a VERY popular addition to the pirate party we had.

And so it begins… 
But I encouraged my friend NOT to plan on dying anytime soon, because he’s one of my “inner five” and I need him around!

Since then I’ve learned that I’m a really sucky editor and I’ve still not gotten the thing into manuscript format, but I *wrote* it! Dagnabbit!  I did it.  And its not bad!!!  Really, I’m sure I’m an unbiased opinion on this one!

So this year I’m writing again…but I’m writing code.  You see I have a plan in place.  It’s a loose plan, because whenever I really tie myself to a plan the universe laughs and then tosses my plans all a tumble, like a bully with lincoln logs.  Its horrible.  So its just a loose plan, but its a good one and I hope it all comes together. So in the meantime I’m doing the work to make it happen.

I’ve done magick for twenty years now and I weave spells and intentions into everything.  I’ve heard of people weaving spells into their code, but I’ve never done it myself.  This time I think I’m going to try it.  You see my “plan” involves me being in one place and trying very, very hard to build a stable life in another place.  I can’t be there enough to pour my essence into the ground and air and water of that area.  But I can slip it into my code and when its accessed there; for a job, for a house, for a community….it’ll slip into the viewer and assist me efforts.

Yeah…that’s the plan.

NANOPAGE