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20 Oil Rigs Gone

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in Breaking News, Economy, Environment, Hurricane Katrina

Not that it really matters right now, but I fear that gas prices are going to go through the rough.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - At least 20 oil rigs and platforms are missing in the Gulf of Mexico and a ruptured gas pipeline is on fire after Hurricane Katrina tore through the region, a US Coast Guard official said.

“We have confirmed at least 20 rigs or platforms missing, either sunk or adrift, and one confirmed fire where a rig was,” Petty Officer Robert Reed of the Louisiana Coast Guard told AFP.

All of the missing rigs were in the Gulf of Mexico, Reed said citing Coast Guard overflights of the area and information from oil companies.

He could not confirm the location of the blaze but said it would “eventually burn out” and no fire-fighting intervention was needed.

“We are of course working on the environmental side of things but right now we are still concentrating on search-and-rescue missions to save as many lives as possible on land,” said Reed, whose own Coast Guard team has been evacuated from the flooded city of New Orleans to Alexandria, Louisiana.

To replace these operations, it’ll cost billions of dollars. Expect to see the cost passed along to you at the pump.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 1st, 2005 and is filed under Breaking News, Economy, Environment, Hurricane Katrina. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “20 Oil Rigs Gone”

thisandthat Says:
September 1st, 2005 at 11:47 am
There are something like 6500 rigs in the gulf. The loss of the deeper drilling ones would be the worst (most expensive) and I understand that only 4 of those are damaged (2 tilted, 1 flipped, 1 gone). The others are closer to shore and thus less expensive to fix.

At least two pipelines are going back on line today.

I dunno about the long-term impact of the rig damage; 20 out of 6500+ seems rather small.
Justin Gardner Says:
September 1st, 2005 at 1:08 pm
Not 6500. More like 4000. And the manned ones number around 800.

But this is very good news. Where are you hearing this number of only 4?
the english guy Says:
September 1st, 2005 at 2:26 pm
Thanks for the article, very interesting. Is Donklephant supporting any charity for the relief fund? I don’t notice anything on the front page.
Justin Gardner Says:
September 1st, 2005 at 4:15 pm
We’ve had various posts on it, but no definitive, permanent post. Thanks for the idea. I should have thought about it sooner.

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