How will drilling two relief wells stop the original leaking well?

[Tidybuoy]

I'm curious how will drilling two relief wells stop the original well from pumping oil into the gulf?

Thinking simplistically, If I turn on one faucet in my house, then go turn on two or even more faucets...the original faucet does not turn off. Of course the pressure in the original faucet will decrease.

Do any of the oil engineers on this project know what the ultimate pressure of this well is? I'm thinking that the current pressure might not be known as it is currently defined by the size of the pipe and it's maximum ability to flow. Adding new relief wells may not change the pressure at all..

Just wondering. I'm not an engineer.

[cgarr]

I'm not an engineer but every time my wife fires up the wash machine when I am in the shower things get real small! Just say-in

[Tidybuoy]

Maybe that's when she does her Kagel excercises....

[porsche4life]

I think they are trying to relieve the pressure on the leaking well so they can get it capped... They aren't going to stop the leak... They are just going to get it to a manageable pressure...

[johnnywishbone]

? Provide an injection point for slurry?

[DanielDudley]

If this were happening in China, someone would have either committed suicide or been executed. I am currently for the latter. It might speed things up.

[Noah930]

I thought the point of a relief well was to intersect the original one to allow for an access point to clog/stop it.

[Venetian]

They will intersect the wellbore close to total depth and pump heavy mud up the original well to kill it. The heavy mud provides sufficient hydrostatic pressure to overcome the formation pressure. This would be followed by cement to ensure flow stoppage. This is the theory at least. I assume 2 wells are being drilled in case there are problems with one of the relief wells ie redundancy.

[Instrument 41]

It won't.....Lot of national news not telling the entire truth. Just a way for them to get their oil. The BIG issue that the national news is not saying is that there is a possibility that the earths surface down there could crack and or crumble, you think we have a mess now!! They are already saying that this next move, successful or not, will increase the flow rate by 20%.
I question why there hasn't been a brain trust locked togerther in one room to come with a idea. I can't tell you the huge numbers of business that have products that can effectively deal with this disaster and they are being turned away. The dispersant, still being used, was determined by the feds was toxic and should not be used. There are scores of oil dispersant's just waiting to be used and BP won't give them the time of day.
BP is looking at this as an opportunity. An opportunity to discover new methods of dealing with this issue. The monies they will make off of theses new discoveries is untold. Just mentioned that it may be mid August before they stop the flow..utterly frustrating.

Just wait till our first hurricane. It will send a tidal surges sending oil into places not thought of and the storm will pick up oil and dispersants and send as far north as the storm travels.

[Normy]

The problem with this whole scheme is that they need to intercept the bore that is currently turning the Gulf of Mexico into vinaigrette. "Intercepting a bore" in this case amounts to aiming a 36 inch tube from a boat....down 5000 feet of water [current; and the boat is fighting current too-] to start drilling into mud and rock. Many of those levels of rock are filled with methane gas under pressure, and lodged within very soft rock that keeps cracking and forcing more gas pressure up the well. We aren't drilling a hole with a solid bit- we are drilling a hollow hole with a hollow bit, so when we encounter a gas pocket, the pressure shoots up the pipe, looking for a place to explode.

Then, this 36 inch tube needs to find its way down to another 36 inch tube, while being remotely drilled from 5000 feet above. It needs to curve to find this tiny tube; The difficulty of this is mind boggling!

I guess they think that they can make this work. My opinion: What they are planning over the next few days...cutting of the riser and installing a new blowout preventer...probably should have been done immediately.

-Folks: Is it ME or is this technology hopelessly obsolete? This scheize CANNOT happen again-

N!

[Venetian]

QUOTE:

"BP is looking at this as an opportunity. An opportunity to discover new methods of dealing with this issue. The monies they will make off of theses new discoveries is untold. Just mentioned that it may be mid August before they stop the flow..utterly frustrating."


I hardly think so. This could destroy BP.

[Jim Richards]

Originally Posted by Venetian

They will intersect the wellbore close to total depth...

What are the chances that they can actually pull this intersecting the wellbore off?

[Venetian]

QUOTE: "The problem with this whole scheme is that they need to intercept the bore that is currently turning the Gulf of Mexico into vinaigrette. "Intercepting a bore" in this case amounts to aiming a 36 inch tube from a boat....down 5000 feet of water [current; and the boat is fighting current too-] to start drilling into mud and rock. Many of those levels of rock are filled with methane gas under pressure, and lodged within very soft rock that keeps cracking and forcing more gas pressure up the well. We aren't drilling a hole with a solid bit- we are drilling a hollow hole with a hollow bit, so when we encounter a gas pocket, the pressure shoots up the pipe, looking for a place to explode.

Then, this 36 inch tube needs to find its way down to another 36 inch tube, while being remotely drilled from 5000 feet above. It needs to curve to find this tiny tube; The difficulty of this is mind boggling! "




Relief wells are often drilled. The technology exists. Not saying it will be easy or without issues.

[BRPORSCHE]

Pretty darn good Jim.


Normy, stop being an armchair Pet E. BP has some seriously smart guys.

Edit: Also food for thought...Google BP + tiber. They have, if I am not mistaken, one of the deepest wells in the Gulf. I have seen rock personally from 34,000 ft.

[dtw]

Why the fk haven't they brought Bruce Willis in on this yet??

[Normy]

Originally Posted by BRPORSCHE

Pretty darn good Jim.


Normy, stop being an armchair Pet E. BP has some seriously smart guys.

Edit: Also food for thought...Google BP + tiber. They have, if I am not mistaken, one of the deepest wells in the Gulf. I have seen rock personally from 34,000 ft.

Really? So if BP has some "seriously smart guys"....how did we get into this fix in the first place?

Huh?

HELLO?


N!

[MotoSook]

Originally Posted by Normy

Really? So if BP has some "seriously smart guys"....how did we get into this fix in the first place?

Huh?

HELLO?


N!

Some pretty smart guys worked on the Hubble telescope too...look what happened with that after launch...

Some pretty smart guys worked on the Mars lander too....remember that?

Some pretty smark guys worked on the space shuttle Columbia too....



All ecological and financial consequences considered for those affected by this thing, I would love to be on the team working on the problem. It's an engineering challenge like no other.

[dlockhart]

Originally Posted by Soukus

I would love to be on the team working on the problem. It's an engineering challenge like no other.

The engineer who solves this mess will be a hero for a moment and has a outside shot at finally getting laid

[red-beard]

Blowout Control, Part 11 - Relief Well

There are some pretty sophisticated techniques today.

[MotoSook]

Originally Posted by dlockhart

The engineer who solves this mess will be a hero for a moment and has a outside shot at finally getting laid

I haven't even thought about the getting laid part...really?