Maybe It Wasn’t BP’s Fault After All

The lead article in today’s New York Times, “Siren in Oil Rig was Kept Silent,” notes the emergency alarm on the Deepwater Horizon rig was kept in the “inhibited” mode to avoid waking up the workers with false alarms in the middle of the night.

But the article is much more “alarming” in its interior details describing the actions, or lack of action, by Transocean, the owner of the rig. BP’s confidential audit of the rig in September showed 390 repairs uncompleted, including many labelled high priority. There were also power losses, computer failures and leaking equipment that was supposed to be waterproof.

And a previous audit by Lloyd’s Register Group showed 26 components in poor working order. All this neglect made the Deepwater Horizon rig an accident waiting to happen. It was not just an unfortunate and unlikely combination of events that caused the Gulf of Mexico oil spill; it was criminal neglect. And that neglect, based on this article, extends to Transocean every bit as much as BP.

Not to leave BP completely off the hook, however. The oil well was running behind schedule, and each day of delay was costing the company $1 million in rental costs for the rig. Workers were obviously pressured to “hurry up,” and haste leads to cutting corners and compounding the situation.