TransOcean BP Oil Rig Accident & Explosion

Deepwater Horizon, an offshore drilling platform owned by Transocean Limited, exploded with at least 126 people onboard

Location: Gulf of Mexico
April 21, 2010

On April 21, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon, an offshore drilling platform owned by Transocean Limited, exploded with at least 126 people onboard. The Deepwater Horizon is a type of platform known as a semi-submersible rig. At the time of the explosion, the platform was actively drilling but was not in production according to a spokesman for Transocean Ltd. The rig was under contract to British Petroleum PLC ("BP").
While some of the offshore workers escaped the blast, many were injured and 11 are missing and presumed dead.

The explosion occurred in the Gulf of Mexico about 52 miles southeast of Venice, Louisiana, left the rig burning and in flames. Ultimately, the rig collapsed into the sea.

The Buzbee Law Firm (www.txattorneys.com) has represented thousands of injured offshore workers, including several with claims against Transocean. Tony Buzbee successfully concluded a unique class action lawsuit on behalf of offshore workers relating to wage fixing by offshore employers, resulting in a $75 million settlement. The Buzbee Law Firm recently obtained a $100 million gross negligence verdict against BP in a Galveston federal court, and has represented hundreds of injured workers with claims against BP.

Not surprisingly, respected and well known Houston attorney has filed one of the first lawsuits against both Transocean and BP on behalf of six workers injured as a result of the Deepwater Horizon explosion. The case seeks more than $30 million. Buzbee, a former Marine Captain who was selected as one of the top five attorneys in Texas, obtained the highest verdict ever recorded in Galveston County in December against BP. That verdict was in excess of $100 million.

Now, Buzbee takes on his old nemesis, Transocean, as well as BP, in what most are saying will be one of the most important and difficult offshore cases in decades. According to Buzbee: "Potential clients need to be aware that this will be a tough case, and they need a seasoned, experienced attorney to handle it. Whenever something like this happens, far too many clients are misled and hire inexperienced attorneys because they are cold called. You need to hire the best; someone that these companies will fear and respect."

Buzbee was the lead attorney a few years back when the Parker 14J collapsed. In that accident, Buzbee's clients reportedly received more in compensation than did the clients of any other attorney. According to Buzbee: "I have a long history with Transocean. Back in 2001, they paid my clients $15 million dollars for alleged wage fixing. I have sued them multiple times over the years for negligence and injuries suffered by offshore drilling workers." Tony Buzbee has more than eight lawyers and a full support staff, and has handled hundreds of cases against all of the major offshore drilling contractors, as well as Halliburton and other offshore companies. Buzbee has handled more cases against BP than any other attorney in the United States, and has the highest verdict and largest settlements with BP than any other attorney in the United States.

Buzbee is optimistic about his chances with Transocean and BP: "I believe there will be other defendants that will be added to the case, including Halliburton and Cameron (the BOP manufacturer). I am a former Recon Marine. I love offshore workers, and have represented them my entire career. When clients hire me, we ensure they get the medical treatment they need, and we take care of them in the event they have household expenses. We are a full service firm, but, in the end, clients and their families hire our firm to win, and that is what we do best." Buzbee continued: "My heart goes out to all of the families involved in this. Our firm can't change the hurt, we can't undo what happened. All we can do now is try to figure out what happened, hold those responsible accountable, and protect the families going forward to make sure they are fully and fairly compensated for this life changing event." The case filed by Buzbee is filed in Houston state court; no trial date is yet set.

Deepwater Horizon Survivors Tell ABC News No Alarm Sounded Before Blast, Safety Gear Failed

'It Was Chaos,' Says Survivor; Industry Officials Acknowledge Failures Of Safety Equipment On Oil Rig

ABC News, Good Morning America
By BRIAN ROSS, VIC WALTER, AVNI PATEL and MATTHEW MOS
May 7, 2010

Survivors of last week's massive oil rig explosion have told ABC News that alarms meant to warn them of an imminent blast never sounded, and oil industry experts now agree that a critical failsafe needed to prevent the blast and the subsequent spill didn't work.

They were two crucial safeguards that failed during the chain reaction that left 11 workers on the Deepwater Horizon dead and led to what some now believe could be the worst oil rig disaster in U.S. history.

"As the bubble made its way to us, it would get bigger and bigger and accelerate rapidly," Smith said. "First thing that would happen would be a water spout. It would have been raining salt water."

Martinez and Sandell said water and mud rose 300 feet into the air.

"I'm sure they tried to hit the switches," Smith said, referring to an emergency valve on the blowout preventer that clamps down on the pipe. "But it would have been too late."

By then, any spark in contact with the cloud of gas would - and did - turn deadly.

Officials from Transocean, the company that owns the rig and leases it to BP, told ABC News they would not speculate as to whether the alarms sounded, or if they did not, why.

Tony Buzbee, the lawyer now representing the two oil rig workers in a lawsuit against BP and Transocean, said he hopes to get those answers.

"It either tells you that the alarms failed or that somebody muted the alarm because alarms are so common out in the oil patch that sometimes as a matter of course, they mute alarms," he said. The oil industry has long had confidence in its series of fail-safes meant to prevent a catastrophe. A key element in the system is one mammoth piece of equipment - the blowout preventer, or BOP. It's a 50-foot, 900,000 pound contraption that sits on the sea bed a mile underwater. It houses more than half-a-dozen hydraulic valves designed to shut off any leaks of oil or gas.

But documents obtained by ABC News show the industry has been well aware for years of significant problems with blowout preventers.

A Transocean official, presenting his findings at an industry conference in 2003, wrote: "Poor BOP reliability is a common and very costly issue confronting all offshore drilling contractors."

ABC News sent questions to BP about the alarm system and the blowout preventers, but BP did not respond. Transocean officials said Thursday they believe it is too soon to know why the blow out preventers failed.

But members of Congress said this week they plan to investigate what went wrong with the blowout preventer beneath the Deepwater Horizon, and determine whether the thousands of other rigs that dot the American coastline pose a continuing risk.

"We saw that this device didn't work. And there were three different backup systems, each one of them didn't work. And now we're suffering the consequences," said Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat.

"The notion that these are a fail-safe mechanism, we're finding out that they're not as safe as people were led to believe," said Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat. The men who worked on Transocean's Deepwater Horizon say there were told this could never happen.

"They always tell us that we have safety devices and warnings and they got ways of shutting it in," Micah Sandell told ABC News." And it don't seem like they had nothing."

Seafood dealers suing over Gulf oil spill

The Daily News
Chris Paschenko
May 6, 2010

DICKINSON — Two seafood dealers are among at least 13 plaintiffs in a $5 million class-action lawsuit that claims businesses were devastated by an oil spill from a Gulf drilling rig explosion.

The April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon killed 11 workers and resulted in an estimated 200,000 gallons of oil spilling daily from an undersea well 41 miles from the Louisiana coast.

The lawsuit blames BP, Halliburton, Cameron Industries and rig owner Transocean for the blowout. Halliburton, however, claimed its work was consistent with normal oil field practices.

Gastian's Pier and Hillman Shrimp and Oyster Corp. rely heavily on seafood caught off Louisiana's coast, said attorney Anthony G. Buzbee, who, as of Wednesday, represented 13 clients.

State Rep. Craig Eiland, D-Galveston, who also is an attorney, is listed as co-counsel on the lawsuit filed Friday in federal court in Galveston.

Oystermen, commercial fishermen and seafood dealer, including Gastian's Pier, which has been in business in Dickinson since 1974, are suffering heavy financial losses, Buzbee said.

“It purchases an average of $40,000 to $50,000 worth of seafood directly from Louisiana or through dealers,” Buzbee said. “Because of the explosion's effect on the ecosystem, her entire business has been devastated,” he said, referring to Dor Gastian, who operates the pier.

Hillman Shrimp and Oyster Corp., with offices in Dickinson and Port Lavaca, process the most oysters on the Gulf Coast, Buzbee said.

“Hillman has been receiving 100 percent of its oysters from Louisiana for quite some time before the explosion,” Buzbee said, noting both offices sustained losses.

BP contracted with Transocean on the drilling operation, and Cameron International built the blowout preventers used by the rig, the lawsuit claims.

A blowout preventer is a large valve at the wellhead that can be closed if underground pressure causes oil or natural gas to enter the well bore and threaten the rig.

Crews were cementing the well being drilled when a blowout occurred, igniting a deadly blast, the lawsuit claims. All of the defendants are to blame for the fire, explosion and oil spill, the lawsuit claims.

Attempts to reach BP and Transocean for comment were unsuccessful. Cameron International declined to comment.

Halliburton claims its cement work was consistent with normal oil field practices, company spokeswoman Cathy Mann said.

“We continue to cooperate with ongoing investigations into the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig incident, as well as assist in efforts to identify the factors that may have lead up to the disaster,” Mann said.

It's premature and irresponsible to speculate on any specific causal issues, Mann said.

The defendants operated the rig with untrained and unlicensed personnel and failed to observe and read gauges that would have indicated excessive pressures in the well, the lawsuit claims.

Thousands of Texas residents could sustain losses or damages associated with the spill, the lawsuit claims.

The plaintiffs seek, among other things, damages of at least $5 million.

Oil Spill Defendants Continue to Play Blame Game

National Law Journal
Tresa Baldas
May 13, 2010

The finger-pointing game over the still-gushing oil disaster came full circle on Capitol Hill on Wednesday.

Cameron International Corp. completed the circle when CEO Jack Moore laid the blame elsewhere in trying to explain to a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee what caused the April 20 explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.

Moore, whose company supplied the blowout preventers that allegedly failed, testified that it created the safety devices pursuant to BP Plc's specifications.

That testimony came a day after senior executives with BP, Halliburton Energy Services Inc. and Transocean Ltd. -- the three other main defendants in the oil spill litigation -- had already blamed each other in testimony before two Senate committees.

BP America Chairman Lamar McKay said that, although BP is responsible for cleaning up the oil mess because it was operating the rig, the failure of the safety device was Transocean's responsibility because it owned the rig.

Not so, countered Transocean CEO Steven Newman, who said that drilling projects "begin and end" with the operator -- in this case, BP -- and that a cementing job by Halliburton might have been a factor in the accident.

But Halliburton executive Timothy Probert testified that his company's cementing job was done to BP's specifications.

The blame game has at least one plaintiffs lawyer bracing for a long, heated battle. "Either all of the potential liable parties will make an agreement and make an effort to pay claims, or they'll fight it out and be shooting at each other," said Tony Buzbee of Houston's Buzbee Law Firm, which has seven oil suits and a dozen more in the pipeline. "I think they'll fight it out. It's already clear based on the congressional testimony."

In particular, "BP is working hard to place blame on everyone," Buzbee said, adding, "BP is going to make Christmas this year very good for a lot of defense lawyers."

Deepwater Horizon owner Transocean seeks liability limit

Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle
By Mary Flood
May 13, 2010, 2:22PM

Transocean, owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig that exploded and sank last month killing 11 and creating a growing oil spill, today got a Houston judge to stay pending cases against the company.

U.S. District Judge Keith Ellison today issued an order suspending cases against Transocean because the company filed a request to limit its liability in the lawsuits filed against it to $26.7 million.

Lawyers involved in the myriad of lawsuits filed against Transocean, rig leaser BP and others said they expected Transocean would take advantage of the Limitation of Liability Act, a maritime law that allows a vessel owner to limit liability to the value of the vessel and its freight.

The law dates back to the mid 1800s when it was passed to protect U.S. vessel owners, eliminating some risk in crisis situations and aiding competition with foreign ships.

Guy Cantwell, a spokesman for Transocean, said the company filed this request on instruction from its insurers and to preserve its insurance.

"We believe it is necessary to protect the interest of employees, shareholders and the company," Cantwell said. He said one goal of this filing is to consolidate a system of claims against Transocean.

Lawyers involved in the litigation say that Transocean's request, if successful, could result in Ellison's court sucking up some other litigation that names Transocean and stems from this same incident. A list of 102 lawsuits already filed against the company was filed with the court today.

"Transocean has compounded this terrible tragedy with a shameful legal filing that is intended solely to protect the company's interests," said Houston lawyer Kurt Arnold who has filed several lawsuits resulting from the offshore explosion.

"They haven't even said they're sorry, much less take responsibility. Now, they're running off to court in hopes of getting a ruling that will limit their liability to what is on the bottom of the ocean. I think the filing is completely frivolous," he said

Some lawyers, like Tony Buzbee, anticipating this move have filed parallel lawsuits, one against Transocean and another against BP, Cameron International and Halliburton for their various roles in the building, maintenance or use of the rig.

Buzbee said he thinks Transocean's attempt to limit its liability will fail. He said that to win, Transocean has to prove that management on shore had no knowledge of the circumstances that caused the explosion. Buzbee said he has a witness who says Transocean and BP knew about abnormal pressure tests before the explosion.

"What it does provide them is a central forum to slow down the cases and to try to leverage a global resolution," Buzbee said.

Lawyers on both sides of the case have already asked federal authorities to set up a multi-district litigation court to hear pre-trial matters on federal lawsuits stemming from the oil spill.

Plaintiffs lawyers in Louisiana have asked that pre-trial matters in spill-related cases be heard by one of a handful of federal judges in New Orleans. BP has asked that the cases be heard by Houston-based U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes.

mary.flood@chron.com