Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Vermillion rig explosion hits Gulf of Mexico drilling site

A rig in the Gulf Coast got an oil platform surge. Nobody passed away while one person was injured. Nobody knows why the blast occurred still. Near Vermillion Bay is where the oil rig explosion occurred. This is on the Louisiana coast. Mariner Energy owned the platform that is hundreds of miles away from the gas platform that exploded in April owned by British Petroleum. The Gulf of Mexico oil leak was a Deepwater rig when the Vermillion oil rig is in shallow waters.

Explosion only hurts one

Only one person was injured in the gas platform surge. 13 people did end up overboard after the drilling rig erupted. The Coast Guard, as outlined by the brand new York Times, received more than one report of an oil rig in flames just after 9 a.m. on today. Helicopters and Coast Guard vessels made their way to the place. It was an hour before they arrived. The Coast Guard rescued 13 workers. All of them were accounted for. Only one of the rig workers was injured, which is nothing short of miraculous, considering the Deepwater gas platform explosion claimed 11 lives.

Shallower waters than British Petroleum oil platform

The Deepwater Horizon oil rig was drilling at a far greater depth than Vermillion Oil Rig 380. The Vermillion oil rig sits atop only 340 feet of water, about 100 miles (80 nautical miles) off the Louisiana coast. According to CNN, the oil rig had previously been producing 9.2 million cubic feet of natural gas and 1,400 barrels of oil per day on average. The Coast Guard is intending first to get the fire out. Mariner Energy dropped 5 percent in shares right after the explosion hit.

Concerns over offshore drilling

Debate over offshore drilling has been hot for a when. It has been years. Every time an oil rig explodes, it makes it appear the practice is too dangerous and poses too much environmental risk to continue. Taxpayers generally have to pay for explosions since resource extraction corporations hardly ever clean up their own mess, although British Petroleum has done a good job with its oil spill.

Discover more data on this subject

CNN

edition.cnn.com/2010/US/09/02/louisiana.oil.rig.explosion/?hpt=T2#fbid=QdDzKvaTDgY and wom=false

NY Times

nytimes.com/2010/09/03/us/03rig.html?partner=rss and emc=rss



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