If you want to understand what the best level of knowledge and understanding of this event is as of today, read the The Oil Drum – Tech Talk: Revisiting Oil Well Pressures and Blowout Preventers after BP’s Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

Yes, I know it’s a mouthful. But it’s got all the information you need to actually understand what’s happening.

In the comment threads, pay especial attention to what ROCKMAN talks about, he is beyond good in this discussion, he’s an oil field engineer, works with drilling pressure I believe, and he knows this stuff inside and out. Heading Out, the author of the initial piece, is also excellent, as are several other contributors to that thread, toolman, a few others.

This discussion is frank and honest and a blessed relief when you compare it to the deluge of pseudo-knowledge the mainstream media subjects us to in such events.

There’s more background on BP as well coming out, for example that they got the Bush group to pull back on the requirements for the very component that failed in this case. As well as their relatively poor safety record, and other issues. But the interesting part in the comment thread is the information these guys are sharing.

In an earlier thread, in the drumbeat part of the oil drum, a few days before, by the way, ROCKMAN revealed that he’d been offered a job in one of the relief well drilling ships, because I guess he’s one of the best guys around at his area of expertise, but he’d sworn off offshore work for his family’s sake some years ago, but he was tempted, due to the catastrophic nature of this disaster.

Educate yourselves though, this is a good resource.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 3rd, 2010 at 18:17 and is filed under Our World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.