Firefighters Flooded Rig, Caused Oil Spill, Suit Says

[IScreamSundays]

Source: businessweek

July 15 (Bloomberg) -- The worst oil spill in U.S. history was triggered by firefighting boats that flooded the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig with water, causing it to sink into the Gulf of Mexico and damage BP Plc’s well, a lawsuit claims.

Commercial fishermen, waterfront property owners and oil industry workers who have lost jobs because of the oil spill yesterday sued 17 companies whose fireboats responded to the explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon on April 20. The rig was still attached to the subsea well when it sank two days later.

“It was the flooding of the Deepwater Horizon and the resulting sinking of the rig that directly caused the piping to break and begin spewing millions of gallons of oil into the ocean,” Lloyd Frischhertz and Gerald Maples, lawyers for the spill victims, said in a complaint filed in federal court in New Orleans.

The lawsuit doesn’t seek damages from BP, rig-owner Transocean Ltd. or the U.S. Coast Guard, which helped direct the firefighting effort. The plaintiffs claim the fireboats violated industry standard procedures that warn against using water cannons to attack pressurized oil fires aboard marine vessels.

snip>

Read more: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-07-15/firefighters-flooded-rig-caused-oil-spill-suit-says.html

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wtf??

[Angry Dragon]

1. What industry standards??

[Axle_techie]

2. Chemistry taught me

That you NEVER use water to fight an oil fire. That said, I don't see justification in attacking rescue workers and firefighters because of a mistake. BP should have been prepared for EVERY eventuality including having to cut off the source at ocean bed level.

This is a frivolous lawsuit that will further remove funds from local government IMO.

[Merchant Marine]

5. Most of the water used in firefighting is for boundary cooling

They were probably trying to keep the hull from melting, in the hopes that some of the rig could be salvaged. The reason for the capsize can probably be traced to a faulty design of anchor chain lockers resulting from the Deepwater Horizon's non-US construction.

And in any case, those fireboats cannot be held sued for doing their job. The fact that the rig sank should be resting on the shoulders of the USCG, who were the incident commanders for the firefighting response.

[Axle_techie]

9. That makes more sense

[mahatmakanejeeves]

14. Adding to your remarks....

1967 USS Forrestal fire, aftermath

Aftermath

....
Even today the Navy commonly refers to the fire aboard Forrestal, and the lessons learned, when teaching damage control and ammunition safety. The Navy circulated the lessons which the men of Forrestal re-learned at such cost throughout the Fleet, and the flight deck film of the flight operations, subsequently entitled Learn Or Burn, became mandatory viewing for fire fighting trainees for years. All new Navy recruits are required to view a training video titled "Trial by Fire: A Carrier Burns", produced from footage of the fire and damage control efforts, both successful and unsuccessful. On the one hand there were damage control teams spraying foam on the deck to contain the flames, which was the correct procedure, while on the other hand crewmen on the other side of the deck sprayed seawater, washing away the foam and worsening the situation by washing burning fuel through the hole in the flight deck into the decks below; burning fuel is not easily extinguished and can in fact be spread by water. Due to the first bomb blast killing nearly all of the specially trained firefighters on the ship, the remaining crew, who had no formal firefighting training, had to improvise,

Nowadays, it is said that every US Navy sailor is a firefighter first. A large portion of basic training is dedicated to firefighting and prevention tactics. Though there were many firefighting tools available on Forrestal, including emergency respirators, the general crew were not trained in their use and failed to use them correctly.

In response, a "wash down" system was incorporated into all carriers, which floods the flight deck with foam or water. Many other fire safety improvements stemmed from this incident.

I do not intend this as a commentary on the merits or lack thereof of the lawsuit.

[earcandle]

3. what a duplicious attempt to reframe those responsible for the damage. It was the explosion that

was the cause of action performed by Halliburton and the
inexperienced or negligent managers that caused the problem
that firefighters
attempted to fix... they were not the first cause of action
and this is a stupid attempt to rewrite history for the idiocy
of America.

Will it survive?  Lets monitor this nonsense and see how bad
off we really are. ..... 

[intheflow]

4. This is utter bullshit.

Why the fuck aren't they suing BP for the initial explosion that caused the need for emergency fire response? :grr:

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

11. They probably are also suing BP

The lawyers are probably just suing anybody/everybody with money.

They get their 30% of any settlement, assuming these suits never get to a courtroom.

:hi:

[IScreamSundays]

15. that is for sure

There are probably more lawyers swarming down on the Gulf Coast than there are clean-up workers.

[Statistical]

17. Sue anyone and everyone who is even remotely connected.

That is lawyers work in the US.

The same law firm likely has field a dozen lawsuits

against BP
against BP partners
against coast guard
against MMS
against state govt oversight boards

and now
against firefighting response.

Throw a bunch of mud and see what sticks. If 4 of the 6 get dismissed, one settles for $100 mil and one goes to court and loses $500 mil that is likely more than one would get from a single lawsuit and with less risk (all eggs not in one case).

[Merchant Marine]

6. This passage indicates a criminal lack of understanding of marine fire fighting

"The fireboats should have used their “dynamic positioning systems” to hold the Deepwater Horizon in place while fighting the fire with industry-approved methods, the complaint alleged. That would have kept the rig connected to the well with an intact riser, “greatly enhancing the ability to manage and control the discharge of oil,” the complaint said."

Complete and utter bullshit. I'd like to note that a "Dynamic Positioning System" is just a rotating thruster controlled by GPS. What they are proposing is the utterly ridiculous idea that the supply boats fighting this fire should have come into contact with the burning rig being fed by an essentially limitless supply of hydrocarbons and still has thousands of gallons of fuel onboard. What they are ignoring is that the only fail-safe method for fighting an oil fire is Aqueous Film Forming Foam or AFFF. Most supply boats with a firefighting manifold onboard are only required to carry a few dozen gallons of the foam concentrate, mainly for fighting fires onboard the boat itself. The inital response would have had barely any foam. A tanker full of the stuff would probably not be enough to fight a blowout fire.

Saying "industry approved methods" without listing any is hilarious in itself, as the fireboats pumping water onto the DWH were doing it at the behest of the USCG, Transocean and BP. The water being pumped on was being done for boundary cooling, in an attempt to keep the rig's hull from melting, at which point it would have sunk anyway. These people seem to think that the rig only had a tiny fire on it, not a towering hydrocarbon inferno that was seen on rigs many miles away from the site.

[KT2000]

7. are BP and Trans-Ocean

behind this. Have they paid some people to bring this suit. I smell a rat.

[Denzil_DC]

8. I smell sharks in the water

Unscrupulous lawyers looking for an easier and quicker target than BP and the other rig-related companies.

Will this dissuade other boats from attempting to fight fires on rigs in future?

[Statistical]

18. Nope business as usual for lawyers. sue anyone and everyone even remotely connected. n/t

[JoeyT]

10. Suing firefighters is way more common than most people would think.

Presumably because it's easier to sue them than whoever is really to blame.

[tanyev]

12. Sure it wasn't the fault of the great big explosion that preceded the fire?

[mikeytherat]

13. And if the firefighters had just let it burn, and the rig broke and sank,

they'd be suing the firefighters for that.

mikey_the_rat

[The Backlash Cometh]

16. Yep. This is the meme from those who listen to right-wing news.