Try this at home. Turn on your garden hose with the sprayer off. It comes out at about 15 psi. Hold your thumb over the hose. Can you stop it? Try throwing all the mud you have in your yard to stop it. Does that work?
My point is they are not using physics. Some one much smarter than I should have figured this won’t work.
PS thanks for the kind words spins22.
Obama on Saturday blamed the mess on “a breakdown of responsibility” at BP.
1) Isn’t it obvious by now BP cannot plug the leak?
2) Where are the Army Corp of Engineers?
3) Why did the people of Louisiana have to order 40 boats to a clean up site near a marsh. PS they were docked doing nothing.
4) If the Feds were there from “day 1” what are they doing, are they golfing? Or is that just the president?
?
Army Corp of Engineers cannot build a good levee much less conduct subsea operations a mile deep, sheesh. You watch too much TV and haven’t a clue regarding the complexity of the situation.
Do the world a favor and educate yourself just a little bit.
“BP sharply reduced its estimate on Monday of how much oil it is siphoning off from a ruptured well”.
Why do we continue to allow BP to handle this disaster? They have proven they are totally incompetent to monitor and assess the situation, much less get a handle on it. After this latest “oops” on their estimates of getting it under control, it’s clear their main objective is to downplay the damage and blow sunshine up our a$$e$, while they buy more time. Remove BP from this debacle now
I wonder how long this could possibly go on. It would nice to know what the estimate on this oil reserve is. A million gallons, a billion gallons??? Maybe that’s what BP is waiting for. Waiting for it to dry up.
“Army Corp of Engineers cannot build a good levee much less conduct subsea operations a mile deep, sheesh. You watch too much TV and haven’t a clue regarding the complexity of the situation.”
1) I don’t watch enough TV. I would like to watch alot more.
2) You act like an expert. I did not I was only suggesting this is out of hand and we need to have more working on the problem.
My solution is rather simple, I just don’t know if it is practical at this depth.
Horizontally bore a hole about 10 to 20 feet below the surface to the pipe. Insert an edcutor making sure it is at least 45 degree angle with the flow to be sure you create proper vacuum. Test flow of eductor with an obvious colored dye, probably red or blue. Once you are sure you are creating a vacuum, you can insert an inflatable object and fill it with what ever works until the object is inflated capping the pipe.
Spins22: The top kill/junk shot procedure seems simple but some of the issues BP may encounter with this approach are as follows. From reading media reports, it’s hard to understand why “dumping mud down a pipe” would take weeks but some of the preparations/precautions that might be involved with doing this at 5,000 feet and 40+ miles from shore are enormous. There are some risks to the casing and BOP from this operation but I don’t have the expertise to talk about them in detail. From the operational end there are some real bottle necks.
I think from what I have read that BP has assembled most if not all of the topside equipment. I heard about mud pumps totaling 30,000 horsepower (your car probably has 200 hp at best), 50,000 or more barrels of mud, etc. That seems to work out to over 15,000 TONS of mud.
A lot of the underwater equipment is probably being engineered and built from scratch. The manifold would be an example.
I know the choke and kill lines were damaged and it was announced they had been cut by the ROVs. Just as an example of what has to happen lets take the task of connecting those lines to the hoses delivering the mud.
The choke and kill lines are at least 3 inch diameter and capable of handling 15,000 psi or more. It is difficult for an average person whose hydraulic experience is usually limited to his home plumbing and garden hose to comprehend what 15,000 psi means in real life.
If you go to your local hardware store the largest valve they will probably stock is a 2 inch PVC or brass valve weighing about 2 to 5 pounds. If you live near an oil patch you can get a 600 psi valve weighing about 10 lbs pretty easily.
A 2 inch valve rated at 15,000 psi is a special made item that probably weighs about 300 to 500 pounds and has a lead time of several months. They are attached to the piping in a shop with specialized welding, 100% X-rayed and have to pass a number of other tests.
In this case we are talking about a 3 inch (or larger) fitting that has to be installed by an ROV, clamped to the line and pass a pressure test before it is used. I will wager the each fitting will weigh at least a half ton, it will be machined from a solid block of specially metal, probably titanium or specialty stainless steel. It will have a variety of toothed slips, smooth slips, seals, actuation pistons, etc. all machined to extremely high tolerance. The fitting must grip the pipe tight enough it can withstand a 100 ton load trying to pull the fitting off (due to the internal pressure), seal without leakage against 15,000 psi, and still not damage the pipe.
The normal lead time to engineer, manufacture a prototype, test it and manufacture the final fittings (assuming the prototype passes all the tests) would usually be about six months or longer — as a rush job.
After the fittings are manufactured they will probably perform a SIT (Systems Integration Test) where they model as closely as possible the actual installation procedure with all the components.
In this case I expect there are at least 40 or more people working in shifts around the clock just doing these fittings. Machine shops will be keeping their best people on standby to immediately start work when the engineers have drawings ready. If this is the critical path item BP will have a jet ready to fly them from Houston to the heliport, or if they are too heavy for a chopper a fast crewboat will be at the dock with engines ticking over.
All of this will be supervised by a variety of safety inspectors from BP and in this case certainly the MMS and probably the USCG. A number of engineers from different companies will review the final design trying to find any potential flaw.
I know the public perception right now it that offshore oil people are a bunch of cowboys cutting corners whenever possible but nothing could be further from the truth. When you are working at these depths, pressures and volumes any mistake can have serious results. The industry has learned over the years that safety, redundancy and intricate planning leads to successful operations — and successful operations are profitable operations. Unsafe operations can have disastrous consequences — as we have just seen.
The fitting I have described is probably the most difficult individual item required to go ahead with the top kill or junk shot, but there are several hundred other items and pieces of equipment required. It really is a major undertaking.
Try this at home. Turn on your garden hose with the sprayer off. It comes out at about 15 psi. Hold your thumb over the hose. Can you stop it? Try throwing all the mud you have in your yard to stop it. Does that work?
My point is they are not using physics. Some one much smarter than I should have figured this won’t work.
PS thanks for the kind words spins22.
At the very bottom of the article:
Obama on Saturday blamed the mess on “a breakdown of responsibility” at BP.
1) Isn’t it obvious by now BP cannot plug the leak?
2) Where are the Army Corp of Engineers?
3) Why did the people of Louisiana have to order 40 boats to a clean up site near a marsh. PS they were docked doing nothing.
4) If the Feds were there from “day 1” what are they doing, are they golfing? Or is that just the president?
?
Army Corp of Engineers cannot build a good levee much less conduct subsea operations a mile deep, sheesh. You watch too much TV and haven’t a clue regarding the complexity of the situation.
Do the world a favor and educate yourself just a little bit.
“BP sharply reduced its estimate on Monday of how much oil it is siphoning off from a ruptured well”.
Why do we continue to allow BP to handle this disaster? They have proven they are totally incompetent to monitor and assess the situation, much less get a handle on it. After this latest “oops” on their estimates of getting it under control, it’s clear their main objective is to downplay the damage and blow sunshine up our a$$e$, while they buy more time. Remove BP from this debacle now
I wonder how long this could possibly go on. It would nice to know what the estimate on this oil reserve is. A million gallons, a billion gallons??? Maybe that’s what BP is waiting for. Waiting for it to dry up.
“Army Corp of Engineers cannot build a good levee much less conduct subsea operations a mile deep, sheesh. You watch too much TV and haven’t a clue regarding the complexity of the situation.”
1) I don’t watch enough TV. I would like to watch alot more.
2) You act like an expert. I did not I was only suggesting this is out of hand and we need to have more working on the problem.
My solution is rather simple, I just don’t know if it is practical at this depth.
Horizontally bore a hole about 10 to 20 feet below the surface to the pipe. Insert an edcutor making sure it is at least 45 degree angle with the flow to be sure you create proper vacuum. Test flow of eductor with an obvious colored dye, probably red or blue. Once you are sure you are creating a vacuum, you can insert an inflatable object and fill it with what ever works until the object is inflated capping the pipe.
Got that from watching Gilligan’s Island reruns.
Hey Realist, sounds like Vlad is onto something! Keep up the good work Vlad, I’m on your side!
Spins22: The top kill/junk shot procedure seems simple but some of the issues BP may encounter with this approach are as follows. From reading media reports, it’s hard to understand why “dumping mud down a pipe” would take weeks but some of the preparations/precautions that might be involved with doing this at 5,000 feet and 40+ miles from shore are enormous. There are some risks to the casing and BOP from this operation but I don’t have the expertise to talk about them in detail. From the operational end there are some real bottle necks.
I think from what I have read that BP has assembled most if not all of the topside equipment. I heard about mud pumps totaling 30,000 horsepower (your car probably has 200 hp at best), 50,000 or more barrels of mud, etc. That seems to work out to over 15,000 TONS of mud.
A lot of the underwater equipment is probably being engineered and built from scratch. The manifold would be an example.
I know the choke and kill lines were damaged and it was announced they had been cut by the ROVs. Just as an example of what has to happen lets take the task of connecting those lines to the hoses delivering the mud.
The choke and kill lines are at least 3 inch diameter and capable of handling 15,000 psi or more. It is difficult for an average person whose hydraulic experience is usually limited to his home plumbing and garden hose to comprehend what 15,000 psi means in real life.
If you go to your local hardware store the largest valve they will probably stock is a 2 inch PVC or brass valve weighing about 2 to 5 pounds. If you live near an oil patch you can get a 600 psi valve weighing about 10 lbs pretty easily.
A 2 inch valve rated at 15,000 psi is a special made item that probably weighs about 300 to 500 pounds and has a lead time of several months. They are attached to the piping in a shop with specialized welding, 100% X-rayed and have to pass a number of other tests.
In this case we are talking about a 3 inch (or larger) fitting that has to be installed by an ROV, clamped to the line and pass a pressure test before it is used. I will wager the each fitting will weigh at least a half ton, it will be machined from a solid block of specially metal, probably titanium or specialty stainless steel. It will have a variety of toothed slips, smooth slips, seals, actuation pistons, etc. all machined to extremely high tolerance. The fitting must grip the pipe tight enough it can withstand a 100 ton load trying to pull the fitting off (due to the internal pressure), seal without leakage against 15,000 psi, and still not damage the pipe.
The normal lead time to engineer, manufacture a prototype, test it and manufacture the final fittings (assuming the prototype passes all the tests) would usually be about six months or longer — as a rush job.
After the fittings are manufactured they will probably perform a SIT (Systems Integration Test) where they model as closely as possible the actual installation procedure with all the components.
In this case I expect there are at least 40 or more people working in shifts around the clock just doing these fittings. Machine shops will be keeping their best people on standby to immediately start work when the engineers have drawings ready. If this is the critical path item BP will have a jet ready to fly them from Houston to the heliport, or if they are too heavy for a chopper a fast crewboat will be at the dock with engines ticking over.
All of this will be supervised by a variety of safety inspectors from BP and in this case certainly the MMS and probably the USCG. A number of engineers from different companies will review the final design trying to find any potential flaw.
I know the public perception right now it that offshore oil people are a bunch of cowboys cutting corners whenever possible but nothing could be further from the truth. When you are working at these depths, pressures and volumes any mistake can have serious results. The industry has learned over the years that safety, redundancy and intricate planning leads to successful operations — and successful operations are profitable operations. Unsafe operations can have disastrous consequences — as we have just seen.
The fitting I have described is probably the most difficult individual item required to go ahead with the top kill or junk shot, but there are several hundred other items and pieces of equipment required. It really is a major undertaking.