Planners see 5 days to evacuate spill-response vessels

July 5, 2010
Spill-response officials estimate they need 120 hr to move vessels and rigs away from the runaway Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico before the anticipated arrival of any gale-force winds.

Spill-response officials estimate they need 120 hr to move vessels and rigs away from the runaway Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico before the anticipated arrival of any gale-force winds.

A gale-force wind is 40 knots, National Incident Commander and retired US Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen told reporters during a news briefing conference call on June 25.

If an approaching hurricane were to force crews to abandon the spill response area and to move all vessels, it could take up to 14 days to redeploy everything, Allen said.

"Obviously, it's going to be a very negative effect," Allen said if a storm were to disrupt the collection of oil and gas now being diverted from spilling into the gulf.

Officials estimate they want a threshold of 114 hr in advance of severe weather to move Transocean Ltd.'s Discoverer Enterprise drillship and 56 hr to move the Helix Q4000 multiservice vessel, Allen said.

The Enterprise and Q4000 both are receiving oil and natural gas from the Macondo well spill. The well is in 5,000 ft of water on Mississippi Canyon Block 252.

Officials want a threshold of 104 hr to disconnect and move the Development Driller III drilling rig, which is drilling the first relief well.

BP is installing two floating risers that would enable faster disconnection of vessels in case a hurricane enters the gulf.

Currently, the Enterprise drillship is connected via a traditional riser pipe to the failed Deepwater Horizon blowout preventer. Numerous other supply and oil storage vessels also are in the spill response area.

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