Crude oil spilling out of its Macondo well is tormenting the already-bruised shores of Louisiana.
There are indications that BP's approach to the drilling of the Macondo well was similarly slapdash.
Anadarko has a 25% stake in the failed Macondo well that led to the Gulf oil spill during April 2010.
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Another former exec David Rainey has been charged with concealing from Congress the amount of oil flowing from the Macondo well.
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"Halliburton (and perhaps BP) should have considered redesigning the foam slurry before pumping it at the Macondo well, " the letter continued.
That explosion claimed the lives of 11 workers and caused the Macondo well to leak crude into the Gulf of Mexico until July.
They start with some embarrassing emails between John Guide, the BP engineer responsible for the ill-fated Macondo well, and David Sims, his boss.
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Outside of the economic focus, Monday included some good news from the Gulf of Mexico, where BP permanently sealed its Macondo well over the weekend.
While BP was extracting the oil from underneath the Gulf of Mexico when the Macondo well exploded, the Deepwater Horizon rig itself was owned by Transocean.
"The commission's findings only compound our sense of tragedy because we know now that the blowout of the Macondo well was avoidable, " said commission co-chairman Bob Graham.
Mix and other engineers had worked tirelessly to calculate the flow rate of oil from the Macondo Well in order to develop a means of stopping the spill.
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Chevron's admission that a spill from a high-pressure Shetland oil well could leak at a higher rate than BP's Macondo well (1, 500 metres below the surface) didn't help.
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However, to date the only person arrested from the BP team has been Kurt Mix who was recruited by BP hours after the Macondo Well exploded on April 20, 2010.
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Monday's presentation kicked off a two-day hearing that is due to include reaction from BP, Transocean and Halliburton, the contractor which did the cement job on the Macondo well.
While deepsea drilling came under scrutiny after BP's tragic Macondo well accident this summer, Petrobras executives have expressed confidence about the prospects of the industry, especially off the coast of Brazil.
Halliburton ( HAL) is suing BP ( BP) for negligent misrepresentation, business disparagement and defamation related to the April 2010 Macondo well explosion, in a suit filed in state court in Texas.
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He did not spare contractor Halliburton, either, saying it deserved some of the blame for providing BP with cementing of the Macondo well that was "poorly designed, not properly tested and was unstable".
While many remember the failed blow-out preventer and bad judgement all-around, a sloppy cement job in the Macondo Well, meant to save a couple of days and a few hundred thousand dollars, failed.
However, the letter said investigators were unsure if that fourth test was completed before the cement slurry was poured at the Macondo well, and that Halliburton reported the positive result to BP after the blowout.
Criminal proceedings remain pending for BP supervisors Robert Kaluza and Donald Vidrine, who have been charged with manslaughter for their repeated disregard of abnormally high pressure readings that preceded the blowout of the Macondo well.
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After plaintiffs' attorneys rested their case Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier ruled there was no evidence that BP's drilling fluids contractor M-I LLC made any decision that led to the blowout of BP's Macondo well.
The U.S. Gulf of Mexico is a different story, while the region is poised for quick growth, the ripple effects of the Summer 2010 Macondo well accident has left big scars, both for Transocean and BP.
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The Halliburton information also disclosed an additional test in early April, prior to the explosion, that involved the same mix that was used on the Macondo well and also found it to be unstable, the letter said.
"Halliburton and BP both had results in March showing that a very similar foam slurry design to the one actually pumped at the Macondo well would be unstable, but neither acted upon that data, " the letter said.
Earlier Wednesday, well control expert Calvin Barnhill testified that he believes Deepwater Horizon rig workers "got ahead of themselves" as they tried to seal the Macondo well and prepared to move on to drilling a different well.
Anadarko Petroleum was part owner of the blown-out Macondo well, and on Friday it reiterated its position to BP--expressed as far back as June 18--that BP is responsible for the disaster and that it will withhold any reimbursement.
Before she ruled, the judge heard an apology from a BP executive and emotional testimony from relatives of the 11 workers who died when BP's blown-out Macondo well triggered an explosion on the rig and started the spill.
Second, and more importantly, it indicates that BP believes the blowout at the Macondo well has been stopped, that the cap in place now will continue to hold back the gusher until the relief wells can kill it for good.
The letter from Fred Bartlit Jr. to the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling said that tests in February on a cement slurry similar to what was used on the Macondo well showed instability -- and that both companies had the data.
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