Relief Wells?

Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the National Incident Commander for the Deepwater Horizon BP Oil Spill response, held a press briefing this afternoon, Tuesday June 21.

As part of his prepared address, Adm.Allen said

"Regarding the relief well operations, the Development Driller II is—remains at the 10,677 feet below the sea floor in preparation of closing in on the pipe and doing a ranging technique, which will allow them to hone in for the actual point where they'll penetrate the wellbore. Development Driller II is at 4,662 feet and moving forward."

If those numbers sound familiar, they should. During the press conferece on June 18, last Thursday, he said

"Regarding the relief wells, Development Driller III, which is drilling a first relief well, is now 10,677 feet below the sea floor starting to close in on the well bore. Development Driller II is 4,662 feet below the sea floor and (inaudible) on task."

Meanwhile, a press release issued yesterday by BP stated

"Work on the first relief well, which started May 2, continues and has currently reached a measured depth of 15,936 feet. The second relief well, which started May 16, is at a measured depth of 10,000 feet. Both wells are still estimated to take approximately three months to complete from commencement of drilling."

Which sounds a great deal better, until you look at the accompanying diagram and see that they inexplicably include the 5,249' water depth in their number. This places the BP depth at 10,687' for well #1 and 4,751' for well #2. While the claim that the directional drilling of deeper well is in need of careful tuning to successfully intersect with the 7"-9" casing (depending on where they meet) it is clear that the progress is painfully slow.

Download a hi-res pdf version of this image [HERE]