Australia Blazing Oil Rig May Collapse

Would a Responsible Govt Allow Such Ecocide Continue for So Long?

Australia Oil Rig May Collapse, Fire Out of Control: PTTEP

On August 23, 2009 FEWW asserted that the Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse

It has, and there’s no sign of abating.

West Atlas oil rig and Montara wellhead platform on fire. Photo supplied by PTTEP via abc.net

Australian government’s silence to the ongoing ecological disaster in Timor Sea has been deafening, their inaction dazzling, their incompetence deplorable and devastating for the region, planet.

Just over 10 weeks after the leak started on August 21, 2009, the size of the oil slick spewing out of a  ruptured pipe at the West Atlas oil rig, which caught fire on Sunday, had grown to about 30,000 km².

Based on all the information they have received, FEWW Moderators believe some 29,000 tons of oil and gas condensate have been leaked into Timor Sea so far.

A laboratory analysis conducted by the Indonesian Environmental Impact Management Agency (NTT Bapedalda) on Oct. 10, 2009 found that the  seawater contained 107.2 milligrams of crude oil per liter.

“We believe the pollution was caused by an oil spill from the Montara oil field in the Timor Sea,” the head of NTT Bapedalda, Alexander Oematan, told reporters in the provincial capital of Kupang on Wednesday.

ECOCIDE SHOULD BE A CAPITAL CRIME DESERVING CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

More than 10 weeks after a blowout at a newly dug oil well, crude oil and gas condensate continued to leak into the Timor Sea, between northwest Australia and Indonesia. This image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite shows the Timor Sea on October 28, 2009. NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team. Caption by Rebecca Lindsey, NASA’s Earth Observatory. Edited by FEWW.

Related Links:

• Australia Oil Well on Fire
• Australian ecological disaster

• Timor Sea Oil Slick: Growing Australian Disaster
• Major Ecological Disaster Underway in Timor Sea
• Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse

• Australia Fails to Plug Oil Leak in Timor Sea
• How Much Oil Pollution Is Too Much?
• FEWW Earthquake Forecast: Timor Sea

Related Media Links:

• Oil and fire disaster ‘ruining state’s reputation’
• Key questions in a 71-day disaster
• The oil spill in Timor Sea grows daily

• Timor Sea oil spill costs $5.3m – so far
• First attempt to plug oil leak fails
• Second attempt to plug oil leak fails

• Expedition observes hundreds of marine creatures in oil slick
  http://wwf.org.au/news/expedition-observes-hundreds-of-marine-creatures-in-oil-slick/

• Australian oil spill ‘contaminating one of world’s richest marine wildernesses’
  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/oct/23/australia-oil-spill?commentpage=1

Recent Oil Spills:

• Gulf of Mexico receives its regular ration of oil spill
• Oil Spills, Earthquakes and Faults

• Magnitude 6.8 EQ Strikes BANDA SEA
• Deadly Earthquake Strikes Java, Indonesia
• Exxon Pays Peanuts to the Monkeys

• 4m liters of crude spill into French nature reserve
• Old MacDonald Had a Fleet
• Shell Leaks in Shabby Style!
• Exxon Mobile Court Orders Only Fraction of Damages
• Another Day, Another Oil Spill in Alaska

• Chevron should pay $27 billion in compensation
• US Govt Sues BP America
• Australia hit by another man-made disaster
• Large spill at Canada’s oil sands terminal

Australia Fails to Plug Oil Leak in Timor Sea

UPDATE: Australia Oil Well on Fire

Australia’s Disastrous Oil Spill in Timor Sea Grows in Magnitude

PTTEP, the company responsible for the disaster, said they would plug the well and stop the leak by mid-October. They Lied.

PTTEP failed for the second time to stop the oil leak from the West Atlas rig which has been leaking for nearly two months. They don’t know when a third attempt to stop the leak could be made, if any.

Environmentalists have been calling for the company to reveal how much oil has leaked out so far and what actually caused the damage in the first place.

The rig’s operators now say that plugging the leak is an “extraordinarily complex” task, a statement which a far cry from their earlier assurances.

Sources say up to 500 barrels of oil a day have been leaking into the Timor Sea since the leak was first discovered on August 21.

Oil leak from West Atlas oil rig into Timor Sea. Photo: Chris Twomey/WAToday. Image may be subject to copyright. More Images …

Indonesian fishermen have reportedly found “thousands of dead fish.”

John Carey, a spokesman for the Pew Environment Group in Kimberley, Australia was quoted as saying that there was still too much mystery surrounding the cause of the leak.

“We are deeply concerned,” he said.

“We have been given repeated assurances that the oil spill will be under control. The Australian public has been given repeated assurances and none of those assurances have been met.

“It’s now seven weeks on. Two attempts. We’ve seen delay after delay. So clearly we are very concerned about when this is actually going to get under control.”

Mr Carey acknowledges that the operation to plug the well is technical and complex one, targeting a small hole about 2.6 kilometres under the seabed.

“But what we’re calling for is some clarity on what’s actually happened,” he said.

“It is still unclear exactly what went wrong. Now surely after seven weeks the company should be able to tell us what happened.

“What was the scenario that caused this to happen. Was it purely a technical fault? Was it a lapse in practice? But we just don’t know.

“Part of the problem for the environment sector and for a range of other stakeholders is the lack of information from both the company and the Government.”

Another widespread concern echoed by Mr Carey is the extent of the spill. Just exactly how much oil has been spilled?

“There have been some suggestions that we look at, you know, near production wells that were already under operation,” he said.

“But again it’s based on estimates. We are now, the conservation sector, looking at seeing if we can get in our consultant, industry consultant to try to provide us [with a] better estimate.

“But this is a ridiculous scenario and it’s a really unfortunate scenario.

“We are all grasping at straws, wanting information, basic information that the company should be able to provide.”

Related New Links:

• First attempt to plug oil leak fails
• Second attempt to plug oil leak fails

Related Links:

• Timor Sea Oil Slick: Growing Australian Disaster
• Major Ecological Disaster Underway in Timor Sea
• Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse

More Links:

• How Much Oil Pollution Is Too Much?
• FEWW Earthquake Forecast: Timor Sea

• Magnitude 6.8 EQ Strikes BANDA SEA
• Deadly Earthquake Strikes Java, Indonesia

• Exxon Pays Peanuts to the Monkeys

• 4m liters of crude spill into French nature reserve
• Old MacDonald Had a Fleet
• Shell Leaks in Shabby Style!
• Exxon Mobile Court Orders Only Fraction of Damages
• Another Day, Another Oil Spill in Alaska

• Chevron should pay $27 billion in compensation
• US Govt Sues BP America
• Australia hit by another man-made disaster
• Large spill at Canada’s oil sands terminal

Major Ecological Disaster Underway in Timor Sea

UPDATE: Australia Oil Well on Fire

Australian Oil Slick – Satellite Images

Background:

Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse

A leaking offshore Australian oil well will probably spill crude  oil into the Timor Sea for the next two months before it can be plugged, according to the Rig operator PTTEP Australasia.

The Montara Well Head Platform, West Atlas oil rig,  has been leaking an estimated 400 tons  (470,000 liters) of oil each day since August 21.

Oil Slick in the Timor Sea

Images acquired August 30, 2009

An oil well in the Timor Sea northwest of Australia has been leaking for more than a week. Operators continue to wait for a new rig to be brought to the site so that they can drill a relief well and cap the leaking one. This image from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite on August 30, 2009, shows the Timor Sea and what are probably oil slicks about 250 kilometers northwest of Western Australia.

In this image, captured on August 30, 2009, the dark patches in the water at the eastern edge of the sunglint are likely oil slicks; they are similar in appearance to other slicks that have been detected in MODIS images, and they are in the correct location (near the leaking oil rig).

The slicks are located about 250 kilometers northwest of the Western Australia town of Truscott. The long distance from land is another indicator that these are oil slicks.

NASA image created by Jesse Allen, using data provided courtesy of the MODIS Rapid Response team. Caption by Rebecca Lindsey, with input from Chuanmin Hu, Institute for Marine Remote Sensing at the University of South Florida. [Edited by FEWW]

Meanwhile, we found these images:

1 September 2009. The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) uses NASA satellite images to displays the area affected by the oil slick, which allegedly remains 180 km off shore from the WA coast. The area under observation spans about 25 nautical miles (nm) x 70 nm (46 km x 130km). Click on the image to enlarge.

The West Atlas oil rig is thought to have been leaking about 470,000 litres of oil a day since an accident caused the rig’s evacuation on August 21. [Source: WAToday. August 30, 2009. Image may be subject to copyright.]

The above diagram by AMSA provides an overview of the behavior of the oil slick. Click on the image to enlarge.

Related Links:

• Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse
• FEWW Earthquake Forecast: Timor Sea
• Magnitude 6.8 EQ Strikes BANDA SEA
• Deadly Earthquake Strikes Java, Indonesia

• Exxon Pays Peanuts to the Monkeys

• 4m liters of crude spill into French nature reserve
• Old MacDonald Had a Fleet
• Shell Leaks in Shabby Style!
• Exxon Mobile Court Orders Only Fraction of Damages
• Another Day, Another Oil Spill in Alaska

• Chevron should pay $27 billion in compensation
• US Govt Sues BP America
• Australia hit by another man-made disaster
• Large spill at Canada’s oil sands terminal

Deadly Earthquake Strikes Java, Indonesia

Powerful earthquake measuring at least 7.3 Mw strikes off the coast of Java, Indonesia.

FEWW ‘EarthModel’ estimated the magnitude as 7.6 Mw, while the quake was recorded by the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center as a magnitude 7.3Mw (±0.4 )

More than 20 people have been killed according to the initial reports, with  hundreds of structures destroyed or damaged in the city of Tasikmalaya and town of Sukabumi west of Java. Thousands of people have been evacuated, taking refuge in open areas, including the grounds of a military base.

Dozens more people were injured, including up to 50 people in Jakarta, about 190km from the epicenter, officials said.

Magnitude 7.6Mw destroyed or damaged many buildings in the city of Tasikmalaya west of the island of Java. Photo: AFP. Image may be subject to copyright.

The quake struck offshore, with the epicenter about 115km west-southwest of Tasikmalaya city (190 km SSE of the Capital Jakarta), at a depth of about 60 km.

The mainshock was followed by at least 4 aftershocks, with 2 of the shocks measuring 5.6 and  5.2. Local tsunami warnings automatically issued after the quake have now been withdrawn. Local seismologists reported small  sea levels rises near the west coast of Java.

Summary of Earthquake details as reported by
European-Mediterranean Seismological Center

Magnitude:  7.3 Mw (±0.4 )
Region:  JAVA, INDONESIA

Date and time: 2009-09-02 at 07:55:03.8 UTC
Location: 7.84 S ; 107.35 E
Depth: 70 km
Distances:

• 91 km S Banjaran (pop 164,952 ; local time 14:55 2009-09-02)
• 72 km S Banjar (pop 37,263 ; local time 14:55 2009-09-02

Automatic GEOFON Global Seismic Monitor

© Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum – GFZ

GFZ Potsdam – Earthquake Bulletin

• Region: Java, Indonesia
• Time: 2009-09-02 07:55:02.7 UTC
• Magnitude: 7.4
• Epicenter: 107.34°E 8.00°S
• Depth: 62 km
• Status: manually revised

USGS/EHP
In line with their current practice of downsizing nearly all their EQ reports in 2009, USGS Earthquake Hazard Program downgraded the quake to a magnitude 7.0 Mw.

FEWW Earthquake Forecast For Java/Bali Region:

• Region: Java/Bali, Indonesia
• Date of Occurrence: September to Late December 2009
• Magnitude: 8.4+
• Epicenter: 10°40’31.43″S 114°55’33.81″E
• Depth: 40 km

Related Links:

• Magnitude 6.8 EQ Strikes BANDA SEA
• Earthquake Forecast: Timor Sea
• Australian Oil Disaster May Get a Lot Worse
• FEWW Earthquake Links