BP is running around apologizing to everyone they can find. Obama says give us $20 billion in escrow and $100 million for the people Obama put out of
work on the oil rigs due to his six month ban — and BP says, "Sure thing mate, no problem."
And all of this in a 20-minute meeting?
I've been dealing with oil companies for a long time and it just doesn't add up...
Contrast it, for instance, with the Exxon situation in Alaska or the Union Carbide disaster in India.
Exxon fought tooth and nail for its shareholders; it appealed court rulings for 19 years. Union Carbide wasn't settled for 25 years.
BP is rolling over like a simpering dog. Why?
The only reason I can think of is that the company knows — better if not as well as the Obama administration does — that it will get worse.
Much worse.
Sincerely,
Christian DeHaemer
Editor, Energy and Capital
BP Supervisor Was Fired For Expressing Safety Concerns
Lucia Graves
[email protected] | HuffPost Reporting
www.huffingtonpost.com...
First Posted: 06-17-10
Ken Abbott, a former project control supervisor on BP's Atlantis deepwater oil rig, was fired in 2009 after expressing concerns about the safety of
the operation.
"I got a lot of pressure from the lead engineers and from the managers saying, 'Don't do that; don't push so much; we don't want to mess with
that,'" Abbott told HuffPost in an interview Wednesday. "I feel like the real reason I was fired was because I was trying to raise a safety issue,
and you know BP has a long history of getting rid of people who try to raise safety issues. I was one of those victims."
"Management sets the tone," Abbott added. "If they think that production is more important than safety, then that's the tone of the company, and
that was the tone at Atlantis."
In his testimony on the Hill on Thursday, BP CEO Tony Hayward repeatedly said that he didn't make any design choices. "I wasn't involved in any of
the decision-making," he told Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), adding that there were clearly discussions about rig safety among the well's engineering
team.
"You're not taking responsibility," Waxman said. "You're kicking the can down the road and acting like you have nothing to do with... this
company. I find that irresponsible."
Congressional investigators recently obtained internal BP documents showing that BP chose a well design for Deepwater Horizon that was riskier but $3
million cheaper.
The story sounds familiar to Abbott who had his safety recommendations for Atlantis vetoed by BP management for fiscal reasons -- the estimated cost
was $2 million.
In September of 2008, Abbott was warned by his predecessor, Barry Duff, that "hundreds if not thousands" of Atlantis's documents had not been
approved or finalized, and that it could "lead to catastrophic Operator errors."
Duff had reported these concerns to management, but nothing had happened. "They didn't want to spend the money to fix it," Abbott said. "I think
[Duff] was unhappy."
For months, Abbott worked to obtain BP engineer-approved drawings with little, if any, progress. "The more I insisted that we had to develop or
obtain them, the more unpopular I became," he said. Hostilities mounted until he was fired on February 5, 2009.
"I was told that it was a reduction in force due to a slowdown on the Atlantis project, but I was the only person laid off," Abbott said. "Three
weeks before, the BP managers of Atlantis had told the whole rig nobody was going to be laid off, that there was plenty of work to do."
Hayward said under oath Thursday that he feels "a great deal of responsibility" for the Deepwater Horizon explosion this April that triggered the
Gulf Coast catastrophe. "The fire and explosion on the Deepwater Horizon never should have happened and I'm deeply sorry that it did," Hayward
said.
[edit on 24-6-2010 by ImperialMaj]