Cross-posted here at DailyKos, where’s there’s some good discussion and interesting comments by oil-industry types. Also cross-posted here at Phillybits and here at PhillyFuture.
Update [2005-8-31 18:38:42 by Stand Strong]: – Just heard on CNN gas prices in places as high as $6.00/gal.
Hat tip to a Brendan @ Operation Yellow Elephant for forwarding me the email with this site linked in. This site details the devastation upon the oil wells and rigs in the Gulf area.
This is from an oil industry insider I consider quite credible. She was definitely right about everything in her last post. If she’s right about this one, we may finally start to get a true picture of what’s going on.
Update [2005-8-31 18:45:27 by Stand Strong]: – Gonna pull this one out of comments and hat-tip to Marcus Junius Brutus for the tip and link.
20 oil rigs missing in Gulf of Mexico: US Coast Guard
WASHINGTON (AFP) – At least 20 oil rigs and platforms are missing in the Gulf of Mexico and a ruptured gas pipeline is on fire after Hurricane Katrina tore through the region, a US Coast Guard official said.
“We have confirmed at least 20 rigs or platforms missing, either sunk or adrift, and one confirmed fire where a rig was,” Petty Officer Robert Reed of the Louisiana Coast Guard told AFP.
Onto the diary…
Newest (and very informative and very scary) report from an anonymous insider
There are MANY production platforms missing (as in not visible from the air). This means they have been totally lost. I am talking about 10’s of platforms, not single digit numbers. Each platform can have from 4 to 100+ wells on it. Most larger ones have 20-30 wells in this area, with numerous caisson wells. They are on their sides, on the bottom of the gulf – they will likely be left as reef material, provided we can get permission. MMS regulations require us to plug each of the wells that were on these platforms – HUGE cost now, as the platforms are gone… Hopefully, MMS will grant `abandon in place’ status for these wiped out structures.
Sounds like an ecological disaster to me.
In short, the Gulf area hit by the storm is basically in about the same shape as Biloxi. The damage numbers you have gotten from the government and analysts are, in my opinion, much too low. We are looking at YEARS to return to the production levels we had prior to the storm. The eastern Gulf of Mexico is primarily oil production…
There’s more to the article but I think what this basically says is that oil production in the Gulf is going to be affected in a much larger way than is being reported, and also for a much longer time.
