Improving Oil Spill Prevention and Response, Restoring Jobs, and Ensuring Our Energy Security

This book was reprinted from a public document and records from the US Government. It is a collection of hearings that took place in Washington DC, by the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, House of Representatives on February 11th 2011. On April 22nd 2010, the DEEPWATER HORIZON sank and oil and natural gas began spewing from the uncontained well. The evening before, BP began efforts to contain the well by trying to activate the rams, annular preventers and deadman switch on the BOP using remotely operated underwater vehicles. For reasons that are still under investigation, these efforts failed. Over the course of the next 87 days, BP followed these efforts with attempts to place a containment dome over the leaking riser pipe. Each of these efforts failed to completely cut off the flow of oil into the Gulf. The Federal government estimates a total of 4.9 million barrels of oil were released into the Gulf of Mexico during the 87 days the well went uncontained. This book examines the DEEPWATER HORIZON OIL SPILL, its consequences and relevance to the future of offshore drilling, and reexamines what changes have to made in order to produce safer drilling operations that Americans deserve the right to have and expect.