In Mexico, Gulf oil spill draws parallels to worst case ever, the Ixtoc 1 blowout of 1979

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http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/environment/2010-05-23-super-spill_N.htm?csp=34

In Mexico, Gulf oil spill draws parallels to worst case ever
By Chris Hawley, USA TODAY

A piece of hardened oil sludge from a recent spill in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico. On Mexico's Gulf Coast, many residents who lived through the Ixtoc 1 blowout of 1979, the world's worst accidental oil spill, worry that the Deepwater Horizon spill could eventually reach their shores.

By Chris Hawley, USA TODAY
COATZACOALCOS, Mexico — Here on Mexico's Gulf Coast, the Deepwater Horizon disaster has revived memories of the world's worst accidental oil spill, a 1979 blowout that spewed oil for nine months, devastated marine life and covered the Texas and Mexican coasts with gobs of crude.
Now, people here are worried they may be in for a repeat of that disaster as ocean currents begin to catch oil from the Deepwater Horizon well and the Atlantic hurricane season gets underway June 1.

There are strong parallels between the two spills. Like the Deepwater Horizon spill, the Ixtoc 1 spill on June 3, 1979, involved the failure of a blowout preventer device, a kind of emergency shutoff valve. In both cases, metal domes put over the well failed to stop the leaks.

And in both cases, crews turned to something called relief wells dug horizontally through the seafloor to stop the spills, a technique that can take months.

The Ixtoc I was an exploratory well being drilled in 160 feet of water about 60 miles northwest of Ciudad del Carmen on Mexico's Gulf coast. By comparison, the Deepwater Horizon well is 5,000 feet deep. The Ixtoc 1 well was owned by Petroleos Mexicanos, Mexico's state oil company, known as Pemex. But it was being drilled by Sedco, a predecessor to Transocean, owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig.

At about 3 a.m. that 1979 day, the drill bit hit a high-pressure pocket of gas and oil. The drill pipe bent, the blowout preventer failed, and an oil geyser shot 150 feet before bursting into flames.

Armando Rodriguez was a deckhand on a ship that was laying pipe for the Ixtoc 1 well. He was standing watch when the drilling platform exploded, shooting a pillar of blue flame into the night sky.

"The tower bent in half and went down in sparks," Rodríguez said. "We pulled out all the survivors. Then the oil started getting sucked into the engines, and the captain ordered us to back away."

All 63 crewmembers were rescued without injury. In the April 20 Deepwater Horizon explosion, 11 died.

The Ixtoc spill wiped out fishing along the Mexican coast for nearly two years, said fisherman Agapito Quintana Gomez, 73.

Reaching under a boat behind the offices of the Miguel Aleman Fisherman's Cooperative in Coatzacoalcos, Quintana pulled out what looked like a lump of rubber: hardened sludge from a more recent oil spill. Inside, it was glossy black and smelled like especially pungent tar. "This stuff is poison," Quintana said. "It's going to go everywhere. We saw this happen in '79."

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Re: In Mexico, Gulf oil spill draws parallels to worst case ever, the Ixtoc 1 blowout of 1979

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0527/1979-nbc-news-report-gulf-oil-spill-2010-maddow/

1979 news reports on Mexican oil gusher may as well be from 2010: Maddow

By Stephen C. Webster
Thursday, May 27th, 2010 -- 8:51 pm


From June 3, 1979 straight through March 23, 1980, an oil well in the Gulf of Mexico was spewing up to 30,000 barrels per day. In just 200 feet of water, the Mexican oil company Pemex scrambled to shut down the Ictoc I exploratory well, but to no avail.

The gusher kept flowing, despite attempts to lower a "cone" or "sombrero" onto it. Officials tried to inject the gusher with drilling mud and fire metal orbs into it, but that didn't work either. Finally, after months upon months of oil spray, relief wells succeeded in relieving the pressure, giving conventional methods the leverage to seal the gusher.

If this sounds familiar ... Well, it should.

"It's not just the disaster itself that should sound familiar to you," said MSNBC host Rachel Maddow, appearing on a Wednesday night broadcast. "It's also the techniques that they were using at the time to try and contain the spill."

"If you just closed your eyes and listened to these news reports from 1979, you would be forgiven for thinking you had flipped on the news today," she said.

Maddow added: "I am 37 years old and this happened when I was six -- those haircuts are back in fashion. The stuff that didn't work back then is the same stuff that hasn't worked now; same busted blowout preventer, same ineffective booms, same underwater plumes, same toxic dispersant, same failed containment domes, same junk shot, same top kill. It's all the same technology. The Ixtoc well, which couldn't be plugged for nine months, was in 200 feet of water. Now, in 2010, we're using the same techniques to try to plug a well that is leaking in 5,000 feet of water."

The Ixtoc well ultimately spewed some 3.5 million barrels of crude into the Gulf, according to official estimates. It was the second worst spill in history and the worst ecological disaster to ever affect the US mainland.

Officials estimate the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig and the resulting gusher will go down as the worst environmental disaster in US history.

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Re: In Mexico, Gulf oil spill draws parallels to worst case ever, the Ixtoc 1 blowout of 1979

A loss of drilling mud circulation caused the blowout to occur. The oil and gas blowing out of the well ignited, causing the platform to catch fire. The burning platform collapsed into the wellhead area hindering any immediate attempts to control the blowout. PEMEX hired blowout control experts and other spill control experts including Red Adair, Martech International of Houston, and the Mexican diving company, Daivaz. The Martech response included 50 personnel on site, the remotely operated vehicle TREC, and the submersible Pioneer I. The TREC attempted to find a safe approach to the Blowout Preventer (BOP). The approach was complicated by poor visibility and debris on the seafloor including derrick wreckage and 3000 meters of drilling pipe. Divers were eventually able to reach and activate the BOP, but the pressure of the oil and gas caused the valves to begin rupturing. The BOP was reopened to prevent destroying it. Two relief wells were drilled to relieve pressure from the well to allow response personnel to cap it. Norwegian experts were contracted to bring in skimming equipment and containment booms, and to begin cleanup of the spilled oil. The IXTOC I well continued to spill oil at a rate of 10,000 - 30,000 barrels per day until it was finally capped on March 23, 1980.

Behavior of Oil
Prevailing northerly currents in the western Gulf of Mexico carried spilled oil toward the U.S. A 60-mile by 70-mile patch of sheen containing a 300 foot by 500 foot patch of heavy crude moved toward the Texas coast. On August 6, 1979, tarballs from the spill impacted a 17 mile stretch of Texas beach. Mousse patches impacted the shoreline north of Port Mansfield Channel on August 15 and again on August 18. On August 24, mousse impacted shoreline south of Aransas Pass. By August 26, most of North Padre Island was covered with moderate amounts of oil. As of September 1, all of the south Texas coast had been impacted by oil. A storm lasting from September 13-15 removed the majority of the oil. For the
remainder of the response and subsequent study period (through August 1980) only tarmats were observed on the beaches. Some oil escaped around boom barriers protecting the three major inlets. During the September storm, there was washing of oil over the Barrier Islands. Impacts to the estuaries were minor.

Countermeasures
In the initial stages of the spill, an estimated 30,000 barrels of oil per day were flowing from the well. In July 1979 the pumping of mud into the well reduced the flow to 20,000 barrels per day, and early in August the pumping of nearly 100,000 steel, iron, and lead balls into the well reduced the flow to 10,000 barrels per day. Mexican authorities also drilled two relief wells into the main well to lower the pressure of the blowout. PEMEX claimed that half of the released oil burned when it reached the surface, a third of it evaporated, and the rest was contained or dispersed.

PEMEX contracted Conair Aviation to spray the chemical dispersant Corexit 9527 on the oil. A total of 493 aerial missions were flown, treating 1,100 square miles of oil slick. Dispersants were not used in the U.S. area of the spill because of the dispersant's inability to treat weathered oil. Eventually the OSC requested that Mexico stop using dispersants north of 25?N.

In Texas, an emphasis was placed on coastal countermeasures protecting the bays and lagoons formed by the Barrier Islands. Impacts of oil to the Barrier Island beaches were ranked as second in importance to protecting inlets to the bays and lagoons. This was done with the placement of skimmers and booms. Efforts wereconcentrated on the Brazos-Santiago Pass, Port Mansfield Channel, Aransas Pass, and Cedar Bayou (which during the course of the spill was sealed with sand).

Economically and environmentally sensitive barrier island beaches were cleaned daily. Laborers used rakes and shovels to clean beaches rather than heavier equipment which removed too much sand. Ultimately, 71,500 barrels of oil impacted 162 miles of U.S. beaches, and over 10,000 cubic yards of oiled material were removed.

On August 8, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) began training volunteers for the handling of oiled birds and implemented beach patrols on South Padre Island. Bird cleaning stations were set up by the USFWS on Mustang and South Padre Islands. An overall decrease in bird population densities due to movement from their regular habitats along the oiled shoreline may account for the fact that only a few dead, oiled birds were ever found. After the beaches were cleaned, population densities increased, but not to expected levels. Contamination of food supplies caused many birds to leave their habitats for the duration of the spill. One thousand four hundred twenty one birds were recovered with oiled feathers or feet. The species suffering the most incidents of oiling were the Royal Terns, Blue-faced Boobies, Sanderlings, Willets, Piping Plovers, Black-bellied Plovers, and Snowy Plovers suffered oiling to their feathers while Great Blue Herons, Black-Crowned Night Herons, Noddy Terns, Cattle Egrets and Snowy Egrets had tarred feet.

Special Interests
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The IXTOC I well blowout was an unusual situation with regard to responsibility for, coordination of, and control and cleanup of the spilled oil. The U.S. government publicly requested compensation from Mexico for damages associated with the spill without first entering into negotiations with the Mexican Government. Mexico denied being financially responsible for damages incurred, and refused to help pay cleanup expenses to the U.S.

Officials reported that tourism along the Texas beaches dropped by 60% during the course of the spill.

http://www.incidentnews.gov/incident/6250