1 |
2 | Page 3 |
4
[<<Previous]
E.A. (Ed) Cote, manager of Halifax
Insurance Company's Edmonton office, was personally
acquainted with Dr. J,O,G, (Pete) Sanderson,
consulting geologist in Calgary. On March 29, he
wrote Pete:
...We are interested in this oil well
which went out of control some time ago and I am
wondering if you could advise me in what way an
occurrence of this nature would happen - is it a
case of the well being too powerful for the
equipment or would it be a situation where there was
not the proper care or supervision taken, We are
interested from the negligence viewpoint and I would
appreciate any information you would furnish us
with...4
Sanderson showed the letter to Gene Denton,
General Petroleums/Denton and Spencer head who
obviously was pleased to be made aware of the
problem from an insurance standpoint.5
Pete replied:
...I told him (Mr, Mirtle of
Middleton and Tait) it is a petroleum engineer's
problem and one upon which I would not care to
express a formal opinion, except possibly very
specifically on the geological aspects of the case,
I informed him also that I do a great deal of my
work in co-operation with General Petroleums, the
contractor on that job, and would not care to be
involved in any way except possibly in their
interests. Sorry I cannot be of assistance to you
this time...6
Meanwhile, back at the well, the 7 in. flow line
had come loose and required repairs. This was
accomplished by a lead sheathing. Bohme describes
the patch fabricated by Earl Griffith, mastermind
fabricator, welder and owner of Barber Machine shop
in Edmonton, and installed on April 1:
Quite ingenious, made in two sections so it fitted around
the 7 in. flow line in one part and also around the
bottom of the Hosmer head so that when it was bolted
together it would fit snugly. The patch had a lead
gasket in it that was placed up against the leaking
portion, When the bolts were tightened up, it very
effectively shut off the leak, This was the only
possible solution because leaking oil and gas
precluded the use of a welding torch.
The next decision was reached: to pump massive
amounts of cement slurry down No. 3, using Imperial
No. 48 as the base of operations. Bill Cummer
recalls ordering out the cement, but because of the
road ban and the fact that the roads were in
terrible condition (no gravel, let alone asphalt,
west of Leduc), only half loads were permitted. This
slowed down the mobilization at No. 48. However,
10,000 sacks were stacked on hastily constructed
mats, along with 2,000 sacks of lime. (See Appendix E.)
Bohme recalls the "big cement job" in that they
spent many days packing the cement through the mud
and along 3 in. plank walkways. The trucks could not
get to the planked area so the hands carried it on
their backs.
At that time, there were just two oil
field service companies in Canada: Halliburton and
Dowell. The former had seven cement trucks; one of
these was an old FWD (four wheel drive) with three
horizontal steam pumps, a veteran of Turner Valley
days. It was hoped to use all seven but an emergency
at Lloydminster required two wagons there. Dowell
was talked into loaning two of their trucks (both
power).
R.H, (Dick) Gibbons, Halliburton's Canadian
manager, was approached by Denton and Spencer
regarding the proposed cement job. Dick had
originally come up from the States and was an
admirer of "Cyclone" O'Donnell (a sentiment not
shared by other Halliburton hands at Leduc). When
O'Donnell arrived from Duncan, Oklahoma
headquarters, Pettinger said that "cyclone" had
everything figured out in fifteen minutes as to what
to do. O'Donnell's theory was cement was just as
cheap as mud and if the cement set up in the
Atlantic No. 3 surface casing or drill pipe, so much
the better.
In preparation for the big cement job,
another perforating gun was brought in on April 2,
but it got stuck in the drill pipe. An echometer was
run on April 5 to try to locate fluid levels in the
drill pipe and annulus but nothing definite was
obtained. The line on which the gun had been run was
pulled out at the socket; this line had to be got
out of the way so that a manifold could be installed
on the top of the drill pipe at No. 3 to take the
slurry from No. 48.
Spencer was on hand that day,
wearing his Denton and Spencer hat. He must have
been very anxious to see the cement set up. There
was one person in the Halliburton organization that
could (and did) stand up to Cody: Lyall Thorpe,
field superintendent. When an impasse developed, it
was Lyall who would move in (not without some
pleasure) and force his hard-nosed opinions on
Spencer. Pettinger and Thorne were put in charge of
the trucks and saw to the hooking up of the
manifolds at No. 3 and where the trucks were to be
spotted at No. 48.
[Next>>]
|