Oil spill report - CNN

Oil company BP shouldered some responsibility for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster Wednesday after an internal investigation of the spill, but assigned much of the blame to contractors Halliburton and Transocean.

[Ecce Signum]

YAAAAYYYY! The Blame Game has started!

[DavidH64]

Ecce Signum wrote:

YAAAAYYYY! The Blame Game has started!

Yes it did, with Obama.

BP is not solely to blame. They did not build the drilling platform. The US govt allowed off-shore drilling moratorium to expire. Obama made the statement "off-shore drilling is perfectly safe". Obama denied foreign aid and assistance in the clean up.

[seedtick]

Anyone who is familiar with safety and accident investigation knows the following:
1. An accident is an "unwanted, unplanned event."
2. In virtually every accident you will discover a "chain of events" leading up to the final conclusion.
At any point (link in this chain of events) there is the opportunity to prevent the accident.
I spent several years working in the drilling industry on offshore drilling rigs. IMHO, what BP says could very well be true. I believe that, if the cement job was flawed, as evidenced by the test failure it was the BP "company man" who should have called a halt. If he did not do that the driller on the floor should have refused to do anything until the toolpusher came to the rig floor and investigated what was happening. In matters of safety, especially where a blow out is possible, any one of these people could have stopped the operation.
This is going to be a very interesting court case.

[Ecce Signum]

IMO - When a corporation sub-contracts all or part of a project to ANOTHER company, that does NOT eleviate the primary corporation from ENSURING practices and standards are met.

IF BP did not have supervisory personnel on site at the time of construction, then BP is guilty of negligence, and as the OWNER/OPERATOR of the rig, responsible for any and all errors.

Pretty simple, really.

AFTER that, the internal squabbling about who did what will be handled in a never ending stream of civil suits.

[seedtick]

Ecce Signum wrote:

IMO - When a corporation sub-contracts all or part of a project to ANOTHER company, that does NOT eleviate the primary corporation from ENSURING practices and standards are met.
IF BP did not have supervisory personnel on site at the time of construction, then BP is guilty of negligence, and as the OWNER/OPERATOR of the rig, responsible for any and all errors.
Pretty simple, really.
AFTER that, the internal squabbling about who did what will be handled in a never ending stream of civil suits.

Yes, BP has ultimate responsibility for the spill...period. But, the sub-contractors have responsibility to BP according to their contracts. A probable scenario might be:
1. BP, along with its partners, owned the lease...and ultimately the hole being drilled...and any oil or gas produced.
2. The rig and all its equipment was owned or leased by TransOcean. BP had no responsibility for the construction of or operation of this equipment. However their contract with each sub-contractor determined the necessary equipment and the operating perimeters of this equipment.
3. Service companies, such as Haliburton, were contracted to BP. They follow orders from the BP company man on site.
4. Any special downhole tools were probably leased by BP.
5. The casing was purchased by BP and the drill pipe was probably owned by Transocean, but might well have been owned by BP.
6. The BOP (blow out preventor) was supposedly mfg by Cameron. It was probably owned by Transocean. They will be responsible for its operation and any lack of maintenance. But, BP should have monitored these maintenance activities and tests.
7. Another person in question will be the Mud Engineer...who undoubtly was contracted to BP...but worked for whoever supplied the drilling fluid...and worked with the BP drilling engineers to decide the mud weight and viscosity.
Like I said, it will be an interesting law suit(s).

[Ecce Signum]

Yep. It will be interesting.

And it will draw out the settlement until those affected by the spill are dead and gone.

Other than that, just another judicial spectacle.