You know, I'm probably really LTTP in learning this (Hey, it happened a couple months before I was born!), but the fact that this scenario played out 30 years ago already and the ecology recovered has actually made me a lot less stressed about the possible consequences.
what happened 30 years ago was nothing like this
Best America on
right you got it
0
Options
MrVyngaardLive From New EtoileStraight Outta SosariaRegistered Userregular
So it took the Daily Show to bring this to my attention but over the last 3 years BP has had hundreds of willful safety violations, compared to every other company having less than 8 (Exxon had ONE).
BP doesn't seem like a company to admire on any level.
"The cost of the fine is always less than the cost of compliance."
- neatly printed somewhere in block lettering in any Endron executive's workspace.
Endron might have been fictional, but it's not hard to see where the inspiration came from. Thanks, BP.
That's disgusting.[/QUOTE]
It gets more grotesque, actually. But that's a conversation if had at all is best done in PMs, as not to threadjack.
MrVyngaard on
"now I've got this mental image of caucuses as cafeteria tables in prison, and new congressmen having to beat someone up on inauguration day." - Raiden333
0
Options
FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
You know, I'm probably really LTTP in learning this (Hey, it happened a couple months before I was born!), but the fact that this scenario played out 30 years ago already and the ecology recovered has actually made me a lot less stressed about the possible consequences.
what happened 30 years ago was nothing like this
200 feet of water vs a mile, for example.
Same techniques to stop the thing, though! Top hats, Junk shots, Top Kills, and so on.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
MKR on
0
Options
HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
I can understand mistakes happening and bad luck, but my opinion about BP has dropped a metric fuckton in the last 24 hours (it had already dropped since this shit started) (well, and by virtue of them being an oil company). I'm sure there's ways to lessen the chances of getting a saw stuck when in use.
You know, I'm probably really LTTP in learning this (Hey, it happened a couple months before I was born!), but the fact that this scenario played out 30 years ago already and the ecology recovered has actually made me a lot less stressed about the possible consequences.
what happened 30 years ago was nothing like this
200 feet of water vs a mile, for example.
Same techniques to stop the thing, though! Top hats, Junk shots, Top Kills, and so on.
Another major difference was the distance to land. Deepwater is a lot closer to shore than Ixtoc I, based on the currents the oil was traveling. A lot of the Ixtoc oil had weathered significantly by the time it reached shore, thanks to evaporation and warm weather which fostered the growth of oil-eating microbes. As a result the oil that reached shore was far less toxic than that from the Exxon Valdez spill, which was in far colder conditions.
What was extra-ridiculous about Ixtoc I was it was still going on when an oil tanker crashed and spilled an assload more oil into the Gulf. Even 30 years ago they weren't dumb enough to disperse the oil underwater, though.
Also, there's a chance that a hurricane might help clean the oil out of the wetlands. If flooding can function essentially as a super-high tide, it could carry the surface-floating oil back offshore. A tropical depression hit Texas 30 years ago and essentially cleaned the beaches by carrying off oil-soaked sediment. The bad part was the sediment settled offshore into "tar reefs", pieces of which would break off and wash ashore during subsequent storms. However, if the oil in the wetlands is free-floating or attached to grasses instead of sand, it's possible they might not form such reefs.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
I can understand mistakes happening and bad luck, but my opinion about BP has dropped a metric fuckton in the last 24 hours (it had already dropped since this shit started) (well, and by virtue of them being an oil company). I'm sure there's ways to lessen the chances of getting a saw stuck when in use.
How long were they at it until the saw jammed?
Have you ever gotten a hack saw stuck in a metal pipe?
This saw has hundreds of pounds of pipe holding it in.
MKR on
0
Options
DrakeEdgelord TrashBelow the ecliptic plane.Registered Userregular
edited June 2010
Operating that saw by ROV is probably like trying to cut pipe with buttery baseball mitts on, squinting at the cut sideways through one eye.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
I can understand mistakes happening and bad luck, but my opinion about BP has dropped a metric fuckton in the last 24 hours (it had already dropped since this shit started) (well, and by virtue of them being an oil company). I'm sure there's ways to lessen the chances of getting a saw stuck when in use.
How long were they at it until the saw jammed?
If only they had something to lubricate it with....
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
They just sheared the crap out of the pipe. Now I have to wonder why they don't modify that into a crimper...
I have a strong feeling this is not how engineering works.
Engineering is about solving problems. I don't know how hard it would be to turn that into a crimper, but it couldn't hurt to consider that.
It's already half a crimper.
considering the oil was able to force out literally tons of mud, I don't think crimping the pipe is going to hold.
My personal hair brained solution of choice is just a giant concrete silo say 10-20' across all the way to the surface+ a few feet. I mean the oil already floats on it own, and it will be much wider than the domes pipe itnerface, so ice shouldn't be as big of an issue.
tinwhiskers on
0
Options
DynagripBreak me a million heartsHoustonRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
more likely your boat sinks and makes everything worse, so yeah...
also, you would be able to do zero work with long tethers, risers, ROVs, etc. while dealing with a hurricane.
Have you seen The Abyss? It'd be just like that! Minus the aliens and stuff.
You know, I'm probably really LTTP in learning this (Hey, it happened a couple months before I was born!), but the fact that this scenario played out 30 years ago already and the ecology recovered has actually made me a lot less stressed about the possible consequences.
what happened 30 years ago was nothing like this
Actually, the environmental consequences were much the same. Highly active biosphere has enormous amounts of oil poured into it for months, nothing but relief wells stop it, and yes after a decade or so much of the life has recovered. This is a bigger spill, but it's actually very very similar.
I would think a rock would encounter the same issues the first dome had.
You could drop a rock on it, but the rock would need to be big and heavy enough (after considerations of water displacement) to overcome the pressure of oil. You'd then also need to hope it didn't just flow around the rock. If hypothetically we could move a million tonnes of mountain on top of the spill and then frantically pour concrete around the edge to stop it seeping then it would work, but we can't move a million tonnes of mountain.
I wonder how the Hurricane season will affect this. Could be really bad...
Could be good or bad actually, it might blow the oil further out to sea towards deeper water, or even take the oil and dump it inland (still bad, but much easier to clean up)
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
They just sheared the crap out of the pipe. Now I have to wonder why they don't modify that into a crimper...
I have a strong feeling this is not how engineering works.
Engineering is about solving problems. I don't know how hard it would be to turn that into a crimper, but it couldn't hurt to consider that.
It's already half a crimper.
considering the oil was able to force out literally tons of mud, I don't think crimping the pipe is going to hold.
My personal hair brained solution of choice is just a giant concrete silo say 10-20' across all the way to the surface+ a few feet. I mean the oil already floats on it own, and it will be much wider than the domes pipe itnerface, so ice shouldn't be as big of an issue.
So what you want them to do is build two of these stacked on top of each other underwater without the benefit of a broad base for support.
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
FFS, get your priorities straight.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
You know, I'm probably really LTTP in learning this (Hey, it happened a couple months before I was born!), but the fact that this scenario played out 30 years ago already and the ecology recovered has actually made me a lot less stressed about the possible consequences.
what happened 30 years ago was nothing like this
Actually, the environmental consequences were much the same. Highly active biosphere has enormous amounts of oil poured into it for months, nothing but relief wells stop it, and yes after a decade or so much of the life has recovered. This is a bigger spill, but it's actually very very similar.
Deepwater is much closer to the shore than the Ixtoc I oil spill was, based on the currents the oil will be following. That means the oil from Deepwater will have less time to weather before landfall. Weathering, through evaporation, reduces oil toxicity. Oil from Ixtoc I, by the time it reached shore, was basically tar which then turned to asphalt on the beach. Asphalt isn't good for beach life, but it's not toxic. Animals don't die from walking across a parking lot, they do die from drinking oil. The increased weathering of the Ixtoc I oil is one of the reasons why it didn't devastate sea bird populations like the Exxon Valdez spill did, where weathering was hampered by colder weather/water and thus arrived onshore in a less degraded form.
Basically, not all crude oil presents the same dangers to wildlife, depending on when it comes into contact with said wildlife. The longer oil has to evaporate the less toxic it becomes, because many of the toxic chemicals in the crude are the first to evaporate, but also more sticky/tarry.
There's also the matter of those underwater oil plumes as a result of the subsea dispersion, which were not a factor with the Ixtoc I spill.
...The bad part was the sediment settled offshore into "tar reefs", pieces of which would break off and wash ashore during subsequent storms. However, if the oil in the wetlands is free-floating or attached to grasses instead of sand, it's possible they might not form such reefs.
I still find these every time I go out into the water at St. Pete Beach (close to Tampa). :?
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
FFS, get your priorities straight.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
.
My solution to that, have two damn oil collecting boats. And I'd rather have a 10% chance of a few people dying, than spill 100000 barrels more oil which will cause health consequences and kill 100 people and 1000s of animals.
tbloxham on
"That is cool" - Abraham Lincoln
0
Options
Deebaseron my way to work in a suit and a tieAhhhh...come on fucking guyRegistered Userregular
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
more likely your boat sinks and makes everything worse, so yeah...
also, you would be able to do zero work with long tethers, risers, ROVs, etc. while dealing with a hurricane.
Have you seen The Abyss? It'd be just like that! Minus the aliens and stuff.
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
FFS, get your priorities straight.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
.
My solution to that, have two damn oil collecting boats. And I'd rather have a 10% chance of a few people dying, than spill 100000 barrels more oil which will cause health consequences and kill 100 people and 1000s of animals.
I'm having a hard time telling if you are trolling, or really that fucking stupid.
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
They just sheared the crap out of the pipe. Now I have to wonder why they don't modify that into a crimper...
I have a strong feeling this is not how engineering works.
Engineering is about solving problems. I don't know how hard it would be to turn that into a crimper, but it couldn't hurt to consider that.
It's already half a crimper.
considering the oil was able to force out literally tons of mud, I don't think crimping the pipe is going to hold.
My personal hair brained solution of choice is just a giant concrete silo say 10-20' across all the way to the surface+ a few feet. I mean the oil already floats on it own, and it will be much wider than the domes pipe itnerface, so ice shouldn't be as big of an issue.
So what you want them to do is build two of these stacked on top of each other underwater without the benefit of a broad base for support.
Well, the water would help hold it up, your problem would be cross currents trying to rip the thing in two. You'd have to build it out of reinforced concrete. The water would actually help hold it up, and make it effectively lighter (concrete has a compressive strength of 200 kg/cm^2) and provided you equalized external and interior pressure it would be OK. If you had some kind of giant floating concrete ring builder it might actually be possible, but just like "operation mountain drop" no boat based giant continuous ring builder machine exists.
what about a largish tube made of a fairly dense cloth (layered several times over) sunk down around the spill and given enough slack to allow for currents and such?
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
FFS, get your priorities straight.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
.
My solution to that, have two damn oil collecting boats. And I'd rather have a 10% chance of a few people dying, than spill 100000 barrels more oil which will cause health consequences and kill 100 people and 1000s of animals.
I'm having a hard time telling if you are trolling, or really that fucking stupid.
Well,what I am saying is that if there is a 100% chance of the boat getting blown off the collection pipe then sure, don't go out. However, if the chance is 10% or so of a hurricane knocking the boat off then that boat should absolutely be out there. I think it's actually you who are being stupid if you don't think that. Maybe you are an expert on oil recovery operations in high winds, and the chance is 100% that the boat is blown off, but I doubt you are and I doubt it is. Considering any sensible pipe design would snap off easily under tension there is no risk to the system, only the boat, and if you stop collection of the oil you guarantee 100s of deaths.
% chance of a few deaths vs guarantee of hundreds of deaths. I know which option I'd pick.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
I can understand mistakes happening and bad luck, but my opinion about BP has dropped a metric fuckton in the last 24 hours (it had already dropped since this shit started) (well, and by virtue of them being an oil company). I'm sure there's ways to lessen the chances of getting a saw stuck when in use.
How long were they at it until the saw jammed?
If only they had something to lubricate it with....
what about a largish tube made of a fairly dense cloth (layered several times over) sunk down around the spill and given enough slack to allow for currents and such?
I actually thought about this, but the cloth would get saturated with low density oil and just float away. You might be able to do something with plastic perhaps, but I think the same would happen. The high density water outside wants to be underneath the low density oil inside, it will try and force it's way in. Considering you'd end up with an oil column of the same depth of the sea, the pressure inside the oil column I realize now would always be lower, thus the sea water would just pinch off the oil column.
The only thing which would work is some kind of semi permeable membrane which let through water but not oil, and to which oil didn't stick. You could then pump out all the oil water mix frantically at the top so that more could flow in from the base. The semi permeable membrane would also allow pressure equalization.
Oh, and the other thing which angers me greatly is that they will have to stop recovering oil if there is a hurricane. Honestly, get the biggest boat you can and hope for the damn best, just make sure there is a nice snap off connection to the boat so you don't break the tube if you get blown about. If your boat sinks, ok, 10 people are dead, but moving that boat off for a week while a hurricane passes will definately destroy thousands of lives.
FFS, get your priorities straight.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
.
My solution to that, have two damn oil collecting boats. And I'd rather have a 10% chance of a few people dying, than spill 100000 barrels more oil which will cause health consequences and kill 100 people and 1000s of animals.
I'm having a hard time telling if you are trolling, or really that fucking stupid.
Well,what I am saying is that if there is a 100% chance of the boat getting blown off the collection pipe then sure, don't go out. However, if the chance is 10% or so of a hurricane knocking the boat off then that boat should absolutely be out there. I think it's actually you who are being stupid if you don't think that. Maybe you are an expert on oil recovery operations in high winds, and the chance is 100% that the boat is blown off, but I doubt you are and I doubt it is. Considering any sensible pipe design would snap off easily under tension there is no risk to the system, only the boat, and if you stop collection of the oil you guarantee 100s of deaths.
% chance of a few deaths vs guarantee of hundreds of deaths. I know which option I'd pick.
Sure, cause you don't have to be on the boat. And how does not collecting the oil for a week guarantee deaths?
I don't know if this has been discussed out here or not, but what do you all think of the Russian's first suggestion to simply bury a nuke and turn it all to glass. The radiation damage will be dispersed in the deep waters and it can't be any worse than what the oil is already doing. I seem to recall that they have a 75% success rate with it (3 out of 4 attempts to seal pipes), but they were not as deep as this gulf tragedy.
I don't know if this has been discussed out here or not, but what do you all think of the Russian's first suggestion to simply bury a nuke and turn it all to glass. The radiation damage will be dispersed in the deep waters and it can't be any worse than what the oil is already doing. I seem to recall that they have a 75% success rate with it (3 out of 4 attempts to seal pipes), but they were not as deep as this gulf tragedy.
Okay - here's why I think the ideas re: SET US UP TEH BOMB should be avoided:
So you bury your 0.3 KT (I'd assume you'd use your least destructive warhead) and set it off, hoping to cave-in the hole... and what you wind-up doing instead is cracking-open a fissure that not even your relief wells are going to be able to stop from outgassing.
The Ender on
With Love and Courage
0
Options
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
edited June 2010
If that well is natural frac (very likely), and you blow it with a nuke, and those natural fracs collapse, you're looking at dumping 50x as much oil in the gulf. Not a good plan.
Even if they have artificially fractured the wellbore (unlikely at that depth, but possible), it's still a fracture in the rock allowing pressure and heat transfer.
The issue at hand here, is that America is the only major deep water drilling country that doesn't, by law, require redundant systems at great depth. Why wasn't there a second and third blow out protector in place? Why wasn't there a kill valve away from the main site, safe from blow back?
In a related note: I work in oil and gas (on the technology/engineering side, not production which this is), and this entire incident is a source of a lot of embarrassment and angst for all of us in the industry. We are all very angry at BP, not only from a business point of view, but an environmental one. They've set back the cause of safe drilling by 25 years, at least. The worst part is that BP has a reputation in the industry as being very arrogant, and very negligent. Go figure, the two things that basically led to this disaster.
I don't know if this has been discussed out here or not, but what do you all think of the Russian's first suggestion to simply bury a nuke and turn it all to glass. The radiation damage will be dispersed in the deep waters and it can't be any worse than what the oil is already doing. I seem to recall that they have a 75% success rate with it (3 out of 4 attempts to seal pipes), but they were not as deep as this gulf tragedy.
Okay - here's why I think the ideas re: SET US UP TEH BOMB should be avoided:
So you bury your 0.3 KT (I'd assume you'd use your least destructive warhead) and set it off, hoping to cave-in the hole... and what you wind-up doing instead is cracking-open a fissure that not even your relief wells are going to be able to stop from outgassing.
I think your problem would be solved pretty easily actually.
MORE NUKES!
(No, really, I hope to god they don't do this unless they are 100% sure it would work.)
It'd be cool if they had a clutch of nukes and detonated them while Tony Hayward and various mangers of BP were informed that the relief rig they were on also had nukes attached by Obama by video conferencing stated: "Make your time."
I'm a child
Bastable on
Philippe about the tactical deployment of german Kradschützen during the battle of Kursk:
"I think I can comment on this because I used to live above the Baby Doll Lounge, a topless bar that was once frequented by bikers in lower Manhattan."
Posts
I think if you have a twitter account, you should definitely be following these guys.
3DSFF: 5026-4429-6577
That's disgusting.[/QUOTE]
It gets more grotesque, actually. But that's a conversation if had at all is best done in PMs, as not to threadjack.
200 feet of water vs a mile, for example.
Same techniques to stop the thing, though! Top hats, Junk shots, Top Kills, and so on.
Here is essentially a 212
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHmhxpQEGPo
Murphy's Law knows no mercy.
On one hand, it's not just operating a saw; it's operating a deep-sea saw via remote.
On the other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
On the other other hand, they should have an expert operating it.
Saws get jammed, no matter your knowledge and experience.
I can understand mistakes happening and bad luck, but my opinion about BP has dropped a metric fuckton in the last 24 hours (it had already dropped since this shit started) (well, and by virtue of them being an oil company). I'm sure there's ways to lessen the chances of getting a saw stuck when in use.
How long were they at it until the saw jammed?
Another major difference was the distance to land. Deepwater is a lot closer to shore than Ixtoc I, based on the currents the oil was traveling. A lot of the Ixtoc oil had weathered significantly by the time it reached shore, thanks to evaporation and warm weather which fostered the growth of oil-eating microbes. As a result the oil that reached shore was far less toxic than that from the Exxon Valdez spill, which was in far colder conditions.
What was extra-ridiculous about Ixtoc I was it was still going on when an oil tanker crashed and spilled an assload more oil into the Gulf. Even 30 years ago they weren't dumb enough to disperse the oil underwater, though.
Also, there's a chance that a hurricane might help clean the oil out of the wetlands. If flooding can function essentially as a super-high tide, it could carry the surface-floating oil back offshore. A tropical depression hit Texas 30 years ago and essentially cleaned the beaches by carrying off oil-soaked sediment. The bad part was the sediment settled offshore into "tar reefs", pieces of which would break off and wash ashore during subsequent storms. However, if the oil in the wetlands is free-floating or attached to grasses instead of sand, it's possible they might not form such reefs.
Have you ever gotten a hack saw stuck in a metal pipe?
This saw has hundreds of pounds of pipe holding it in.
Well, no I haven't.
It's a pain in the goose
FFS, get your priorities straight.
considering the oil was able to force out literally tons of mud, I don't think crimping the pipe is going to hold.
My personal hair brained solution of choice is just a giant concrete silo say 10-20' across all the way to the surface+ a few feet. I mean the oil already floats on it own, and it will be much wider than the domes pipe itnerface, so ice shouldn't be as big of an issue.
more likely your boat sinks and makes everything worse, so yeah...
also, you would be able to do zero work with long tethers, risers, ROVs, etc. while dealing with a hurricane.
Have you seen The Abyss? It'd be just like that! Minus the aliens and stuff.
Actually, the environmental consequences were much the same. Highly active biosphere has enormous amounts of oil poured into it for months, nothing but relief wells stop it, and yes after a decade or so much of the life has recovered. This is a bigger spill, but it's actually very very similar.
You could drop a rock on it, but the rock would need to be big and heavy enough (after considerations of water displacement) to overcome the pressure of oil. You'd then also need to hope it didn't just flow around the rock. If hypothetically we could move a million tonnes of mountain on top of the spill and then frantically pour concrete around the edge to stop it seeping then it would work, but we can't move a million tonnes of mountain.
Could be good or bad actually, it might blow the oil further out to sea towards deeper water, or even take the oil and dump it inland (still bad, but much easier to clean up)
So what you want them to do is build two of these stacked on top of each other underwater without the benefit of a broad base for support.
WTF?
Aside from the people dying, if your big oil-collecting boat sinks, you can't use it to collect any more oil. And the oil that was in the boat goes back into the water when it sinks. Now you've got 2 spills to clean up, and dead sailors to boot.
Deepwater is much closer to the shore than the Ixtoc I oil spill was, based on the currents the oil will be following. That means the oil from Deepwater will have less time to weather before landfall. Weathering, through evaporation, reduces oil toxicity. Oil from Ixtoc I, by the time it reached shore, was basically tar which then turned to asphalt on the beach. Asphalt isn't good for beach life, but it's not toxic. Animals don't die from walking across a parking lot, they do die from drinking oil. The increased weathering of the Ixtoc I oil is one of the reasons why it didn't devastate sea bird populations like the Exxon Valdez spill did, where weathering was hampered by colder weather/water and thus arrived onshore in a less degraded form.
Basically, not all crude oil presents the same dangers to wildlife, depending on when it comes into contact with said wildlife. The longer oil has to evaporate the less toxic it becomes, because many of the toxic chemicals in the crude are the first to evaporate, but also more sticky/tarry.
There's also the matter of those underwater oil plumes as a result of the subsea dispersion, which were not a factor with the Ixtoc I spill.
I still find these every time I go out into the water at St. Pete Beach (close to Tampa). :?
My solution to that, have two damn oil collecting boats. And I'd rather have a 10% chance of a few people dying, than spill 100000 barrels more oil which will cause health consequences and kill 100 people and 1000s of animals.
Great idea! Someone call James Cameron!
Oh wait...
I'm having a hard time telling if you are trolling, or really that fucking stupid.
Well, the water would help hold it up, your problem would be cross currents trying to rip the thing in two. You'd have to build it out of reinforced concrete. The water would actually help hold it up, and make it effectively lighter (concrete has a compressive strength of 200 kg/cm^2) and provided you equalized external and interior pressure it would be OK. If you had some kind of giant floating concrete ring builder it might actually be possible, but just like "operation mountain drop" no boat based giant continuous ring builder machine exists.
Well,what I am saying is that if there is a 100% chance of the boat getting blown off the collection pipe then sure, don't go out. However, if the chance is 10% or so of a hurricane knocking the boat off then that boat should absolutely be out there. I think it's actually you who are being stupid if you don't think that. Maybe you are an expert on oil recovery operations in high winds, and the chance is 100% that the boat is blown off, but I doubt you are and I doubt it is. Considering any sensible pipe design would snap off easily under tension there is no risk to the system, only the boat, and if you stop collection of the oil you guarantee 100s of deaths.
% chance of a few deaths vs guarantee of hundreds of deaths. I know which option I'd pick.
I actually thought about this, but the cloth would get saturated with low density oil and just float away. You might be able to do something with plastic perhaps, but I think the same would happen. The high density water outside wants to be underneath the low density oil inside, it will try and force it's way in. Considering you'd end up with an oil column of the same depth of the sea, the pressure inside the oil column I realize now would always be lower, thus the sea water would just pinch off the oil column.
The only thing which would work is some kind of semi permeable membrane which let through water but not oil, and to which oil didn't stick. You could then pump out all the oil water mix frantically at the top so that more could flow in from the base. The semi permeable membrane would also allow pressure equalization.
Sure, cause you don't have to be on the boat. And how does not collecting the oil for a week guarantee deaths?
Okay - here's why I think the ideas re: SET US UP TEH BOMB should be avoided:
So you bury your 0.3 KT (I'd assume you'd use your least destructive warhead) and set it off, hoping to cave-in the hole... and what you wind-up doing instead is cracking-open a fissure that not even your relief wells are going to be able to stop from outgassing.
Even if they have artificially fractured the wellbore (unlikely at that depth, but possible), it's still a fracture in the rock allowing pressure and heat transfer.
The issue at hand here, is that America is the only major deep water drilling country that doesn't, by law, require redundant systems at great depth. Why wasn't there a second and third blow out protector in place? Why wasn't there a kill valve away from the main site, safe from blow back?
In a related note: I work in oil and gas (on the technology/engineering side, not production which this is), and this entire incident is a source of a lot of embarrassment and angst for all of us in the industry. We are all very angry at BP, not only from a business point of view, but an environmental one. They've set back the cause of safe drilling by 25 years, at least. The worst part is that BP has a reputation in the industry as being very arrogant, and very negligent. Go figure, the two things that basically led to this disaster.
I think your problem would be solved pretty easily actually.
MORE NUKES!
(No, really, I hope to god they don't do this unless they are 100% sure it would work.)
I'm a child
"I think I can comment on this because I used to live above the Baby Doll Lounge, a topless bar that was once frequented by bikers in lower Manhattan."