BP Lowers Containment Cap Onto Crippled Wellhead .

[elleng]

Source: nyt/reuters

BP's robot submarines managed late on Thursday to lower a containment cap onto its ruptured deep-sea wellhead in a bid to curtail the flow of oil gushing nonstop into the Gulf of Mexico for 45 days, U.S. cable channels reported.

There was no immediate word from BP or from U.S. officials on the status of the operation.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2010/06/03/news/news-us-oil-spill.html?ref=reuters

[angrycarpenter]

1. The ROV feed looks like the deepest, darkest pit of hell.

Looks like the flow rate has doubled.

[tomm2thumbs]

2. felt the same way

looks like trying to put your little finger into a fully blasting hose - does nothing but spread the water in all directions, but does give a better idea of how much oil is really coming out of that thing vs. a steady flow look

[yourout]

3. To my somewhat trained eye that is well over 1000 gallons a minute.

Around 1.5 million gallons a day.

They very well may have made things worse.

[sandnsea]

4. If the cap doesn't work, the flow will increase

That was part of the risk in doing this and why it wasn't a first choice. That was said in every press conference I came across. Did the reporters not cover that?

[midnight]

5. I hope this works...

[stlsaxman]

6. trimming the pipe with the "sheers" doubled the flow...

[elleng]

7. Yes. The pipe had to be trimmed to be able to fit it with a 'cap' of some kind.

We've known this would happen. We also know that the 'fit' won't be perfect.