When seismic surveys show that there is a good chance of finding oil, companies set about the delicate process of drilling an exploratory well.

ECONOMIST: Inside story

Attempts to use new methods to contain just one of three leakage sites have met with little success, and the process of drilling a relief well will take two or three months.

FORBES: Will The Gulf Spill Derail Offshore Drilling?

Tim Probert, president of global business lines, says that horizontal drilling, a process in which a well is drilled down vertically and then angled around a curve to reach reservoirs from a horizontal angle that increases the well's exposure, is now 55% of Halliburton's total activity.

FORBES

As of March 25, there were 1, 738 rigs preparing for, or in the process of, drilling new oil and gas well across the country.

FORBES: Connect

Although the meeting was primarily to inform local residents about the drilling of the second well concerns were raised by the residents about the controversial process of hydraulic fracturing possibly being used on the site.

BBC: Ballinlea

Understand that what got -- what happened in this incident, on the Deepwater Horizon, was after the drilling reached the reservoir of oil, in the process of capping that well.

WHITEHOUSE: Press Briefing