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Posted by D Sherman [24.19.162.43] on Saturday, June 05, 2010 at 04:06:06 :
In Reply to: Re: BP Oil Well posted by Mike [24.62.237.4] on Friday, June 04, 2010 at 13:38:52 :
Oh, you can crush it all right. Did you see the pictures of the pipe shears that they have? It's one big simple hydraulic claw type shear, and it weighs 40,000 lbs. I believe the riser pipe is 10" dia with 1" walls, and there's a drill pipe down inside it. The shears can cut that whole thing.
You say "pressure isn't a real problem", but simple physics says that for the oil to flow out of that well at all, the pressure has to be at least 2500 psi, and in fact it's much more than that because the oil is gushing out at high speed. Really, this is all on a scale that's way beyond what any of us are used to.
My personal opinion is they're doing almost everything wrong on the cleanup end of it, some of that being the government's fault, but in terms of plugging the leak, they are trying every remotely reasonable idea even though the chance of any of them working is slim. If you want to find a conspiracy, it's that BP's attempts to plug the well may just be an attempt to stall and look busy while waiting for either the pressure to drop naturally or for the relief wells to intercept this well.
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