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The Great Lakes States are on board with Canada.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark in Oshawa
To those states that survive only by river reservoirs and irrigation, life is a bitch, you're screwed.
We have had rivers stop flowing in Minn., we are not going to be more miserable to they do not have to.
[quote="Mark in Oshawa"]
That is not only a lie, but a damned lie; all it took was for the Obama administration to follow, rather than waiver, the law and do the test, then
it would not have happened.
Remember not too long before this, the Obama administration was bragging up BP as the best of oil companies.
BP has to pay, but if any one is tried, it should be people from the Obama Administration.
Bob if you think Dubya was standing over BP threatening to shut them down for shady practices, you are dreaming in technicolor. Listen, I have no time for Obama, but lets cut to the chase. This is a failure and indictment of the US government regulatory structure as a whole. The political will to crack the whip on big oil wasn't there with Bush or Clinton, and it wasn't there with Obama either. No one pays attention to this stuff apparnetly until the oil hits the water.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Riebe
Obama got a lot of money from BP? Great, anyone naive enough to think Bush wasn't getting a lot donations from Big oil? You really want to go down THAT road?
Listen, this is no different than the SEC not cracking the whip on Wall Street. The US government is there to regulate industry, and enforce the law. They didn't before, and didn't this time, and while politcal games and interference make the water murkier, the fact is the bureaucracy in Washington has been allowed to look the other way for years.. Both Parties have a role to play in this, and that is why the Tea Party movement goes after Republicans at times too. People down there are rightfully pissed that government cannot even do the job it is designed to do....
There is no whip to crack. GThe LAST thing needed is Washington with more authority.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark in Oshawa
Back when oil was ten dollars a barrel and thousands of oil workers were out work causing a financial and labor crisis, DC gave oil companies a needed break.
Oil prices came back up but now people want to talk out of both side of their mouths, ignoring why oil companies got the tax laws they did.
What happened to Fannie and Freddie makes this supposed big oil collusion lie, as important as a zit on a gnats ass.
That was a problem caused by both parties of the Fed. government, THIS is strictly OBAMA, giving a waiver that would have prevented this disaster, and now trying to blame anyone but themselves for it.
BP owes he money, Washington should be prosecuted.
The loathing for big oil is based on jealous vengence more than anything.
Good post. :up:Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark in Oshawa
Unfortunately, there are more than a few Americans who (blindly) see things the way that Rep. Joe Barton of Texas does. Hopefully after apologizing to Hayward a couple of days ago, Barton then took Tony out to one of those Korean massage parlors that populate D.C. and treated him to a good rub & tug. Heck, he gave Hayward a rub & tug on the House floor. Might as well pay for him to get another session (with a woman this time) later that evening.
You know another guy whose life has been ruined? Bernie Madoff! Him in jail for life and his poor wife, Ruthie, now has to get permission from the government before she can even buy a new Mercedes! :bigcry: Damn gubment!!!
It'll be interesting to see what the (true) root cause of this blow out was. Were corners cut? Was the issue just on this rig, with whomever was managing this particular project, or is this a systemic problem within BP? Who knew what and when? And as many of us well know, the concept of plausible deniability is the spare ammo that all executives have at their disposal. So it'll be interesting to see how this plays out, as far as BP is concerned... and as far as the failings of our regulatory bodies are concerned.
The valve was not tested due to a government waiver, and it failed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jag_Warrior
End of story.
Instead of imitating Eki and posting Madoff bs, that is not related to the thread, try keeping up with the dozens of news stories on the net, you will probably learn a little more.
It will be interesting to see how Obama tries to change the truth to cover his incompetence, but then he did campaign on change.
This is one I can't help you with, Bob. And it's for the same reason that I didn't accept just everyone who applied to take my Six Sigma classes years ago. When you can understand what root cause analysis is... and more importantly, what it is NOT, come back and we'll discuss this.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Riebe
Until then, please continue humoring us with the "theory" that not inspecting something CAUSES it to malfunction. It's the same sort of backward thinking that's caused more than a few manufacturers to think that increasing inspection steps brings about higher quality. :rolleyes: The system for drilling and capturing this oil was not robust. The question is, "why wasn't it?" And some outside party (even Obama's evil, socialist, fascist gubment) not telling you to do something is not a reason for a system failing.
My experience with Root Cause Analysis (The latest trend in the industrial biz about 6 years ago. If you didn't have an RCFA team up and ready to go, you weren't on the cutting edge of Team Work and Manufacturing Work Systems.) is that RCFA results can be just as wrong as any other method, depending on the integrity of the team. Kind of like a big NASCAR team with heavy oil company sponsorship explaining the cause of their DNF as an ignition failure but not mentioning that after their engine siezed, it blew a chunck of engine block through the ignition module. Some times it what you don't say.
I have a buddy that worked on that rig. His rotation was onshore when the explosion happened. He is still being paid by the company and they have been told to expect to go back to work in August. He and I are both I/E Techs. Prior to Sep 2008, we worked on the same jobsite for 10 years. The "I" portion of the job title stands for instrumentation, i.e., all of the devices and computer systems that create and allow an automated process control. This includes pressure and temperature transmitters, automatic valves, density transmitters, level transmitters, and various detectors.
In any production business, production is king and anything else is secondary. There is nothing unusual about having a system fault "cured" by an I/E through the use of a hard wire jumper (permissive shunt) or going into the software program to install a "force" (a bogus true or not true condition) or a compromise varible that will allow production to continue. This is something an I/E will not do on his own, ever. That decision is made by management and the engineers. This may sound evil but it isn't always so. There are hundreds of control loops that are not critical or may be for information only, without controlling anything. As a general rule, all forces are logged and tagged and are repaired when the parts come in or when that section goes down for routine maintenance. On a critical loop, every I/E I've ever worked with has never been too job scared to let management know that they're playing with fire if they "force" a certain loop. Some, myself included, get them to sign off personally in our Day Timer notebooks before they'll force a critical loop. Sometimes that will stop them in their tracks.
I don't know what caused the blow out but based upon industrial experience my guesses would be:
A geological condition that has not been encountered before.
A navigational or GPS error that allowed the rig to get too far out of position causing the line to bend, raising pressures, and preventing a valve from seating.
Equipment failure in the nature of an automatic valve failing or being unable to seal off due to higher than expected pressures.
Control room personnel refusing to believe they have a process problem and insisting it is a failed instrument. Happens all the time. On land, you can prove quickly that the instrument is ok.
Too many "forces" in control and or cascade loops.
One thing I am sure of without ever having been out there is that management and engineers were warned about (and chose to ignore) dangerous and "iffy" conditions by the guys out there on their tools and doing the work.
You must work in quality control, some where, the attitude of "If I do not test it to see if it will fail, will guarantee it will work" has infested too many companies.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jag_Warrior
Hmmm, not them telling to do something that is required by law to be done once a month, not a reason for it failing.
Shizzam, that was why Obama, as usual did not have the faintest idea, that it might fail, he did not have it tested, which was supposed to be done once a month.
Why your hero, Obama, whose administration had this opinon of that rig:
Since January 2005, inspectors issued just one minor infraction for the rig. That strong track record led the agency last year to herald the Deepwater Horizon as an industry model for safety.
Now as your rhetoric is back to flatulation as usual, the valve failed a test a few hours before the explosion and here is why it was not checked, even though your fearless leader Obama, flaps his lips about change, his talk is cheap as all he does is talk.
From the AP:
LOS ANGELES — The federal agency responsible for ensuring that the Deepwater Horizon was operating safely before it exploded last month fell well short of its own policy that the rig be inspected at least once per month, an Associated Press investigation shows.
In fact, the agency's inspection frequency on the Deepwater Horizon fell dramatically over the past five years, according to federal Minerals Management Service records. The rig blew up April 20, killing 11 people before sinking and triggering a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Since January 2005, inspectors issued just one minor infraction for the rig. That strong track record led the agency last year to herald the Deepwater Horizon as an industry model for safety.
The inspection gaps are the latest in a series of questions raised about the agency's oversight of the oil drilling industry. Members of Congress and President Barack Obama have criticized what they call the cozy relationship between regulators and oil companies and vowed to reform MMS, which both regulates the industry and collects billions in royalties from it.
Earlier AP investigations have shown that the doomed rig was allowed to operate without safety documentation required by MMS regulations for the exact disaster scenario that occurred; that the cutoff valve which failed has repeatedly broken down at other wells in the years since regulators weakened testing requirements; and that regulation is so lax that some key safety aspects on rigs are decided almost entirely by the companies doing the work.
Obama your fearless leader, Mr. Change- Obama, who reads a good teleprompter, had over a year, during which time he did take time to kill oil leases, to make sure there were no waivers and that all tests be done.
Now he can blame it on George Bush, but wait, there were over twelve tests that were not done on his watch, buy hey, why pick-nits?
But NOOOO, he did not have the valve tested in the past year , that one did fail a test, five hours before the explosion, failed again, killing people, but hey why should Obama worry about that, it probably was not on one of the teleprompters he was reading.
" accept just everyone who applied to take my Six Sigma classes years ago. When you can understand what root cause analysis is... and more importantly, what it is NOT, come back and we'll discuss this."
God help your students.
Instead of living in the world of- If a tree falls in a forest, but no one hears it, does it make any sound?-- pixie dust land, try reading the news.
In simplest terms, failure to perform a test or check does not CAUSE a malfunction within a (robust) system. What a foolish thing to suggest. Whether trying to score points against Obama, Bush or anybody else, that's just three shades of stupid. Something in a system fails, and a test or check may (or may not) detect an imminent failure. But all a system check tells you is that the system is properly functioning AT THE TIME THE TEST IS PERFORMED. But since there are similar systems, with similar components in oil rigs around the world, rather than just act the dufus, fully understanding the nature of this failure (and mapping out this failure mode) is the proper way to go. And no matter what BP has done (or not done) up to this point, I'd say there are people on the case now who will do exactly that. At these depths, is enough known about how these BOP's work over time? From what I've read, apparently not. So should checks be done more often on similar rigs RIGHT NOW, should there be a redesign of certain components, should, should, should...?
But the bottom line is, until this failure mode is fully understood, the appropriate corrective action can't be determined.