Critical Analysis of Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

Running head: SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
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1SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Executive summary
The purpose of this report is to critically analyze the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf
of Mexico which is regarded as one of the worst oil spills in history. The report analyzes the
incident from a variety of perspectives including potential regional and global impact. It
describes the technical and non-technical issues that contributed to the disaster. It identifies
and critically evaluates the poor engineering designs that resulted in the Gulf of Mexico
accident. It evaluates the reasons for huge expenses borne after the incident took place.
Further, it analysis the significant quantities and inherent risks that are associated with the
crude oil and evaluates the extensive environmental, social and economic impact caused by
the disaster. Lastly, it concludes the report and provides recommendations to avoid further oil
spills.

2SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Critical Analysis.........................................................................................................................3
Technical problems that contributed to the disaster...............................................................3
Critical Analysis of the non-technical issues leading to disaster...........................................5
Critical evaluation of the poor engineering design that leads to disaster...............................6
Critically evaluation of the aftermath of the Gulf of Mexico accident..................................7
The inherent risks and extensive impact caused by the oil spill............................................8
Conclusion................................................................................................................................10
Recommendations....................................................................................................................11
References................................................................................................................................12

3SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
Introduction
The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is also known as the Deepwater Horizon spill which took
place in the year 2010 on 20th April. It is considered as the world's largest marine oil spill
disaster in history. The Deepwater Horizon rig was managed by offshore oil drilling
company, Transocean and it was leased by BP an oil company. The company was situated in
the Macondo oil prospect in the Mississippi Canyon, which is a valley in the continental
shelf. The oil well was located under the sea bed beneath 4993 feet the surface and it was
extended at 18000 feet into the rock (Board and National Research Council, 2013). The
incident took place in the night on April 20th; the natural gas had blown out through the
concrete well to use the oil for later use. It was believed that the corners of the well were
extremely fragile to hold the pressure. It consisted of a concrete mixture used nitrogen gas to
accelerate curing. Oil was released by the fracture of the core. On releasing the natural gas
travelled to the rigs and rose to the platform (Dubansky et al. 2013). This incident had killed
11 workers and 17 of them were injured. Oil was discharged escaping the damaged well into
the gulf. Although BP had activated the rig's blowout preventer, the device had
malfunctioned, the fail-safe mechanism, BOP had malfunctioned which was designed to
enclose the channel from which the oil was drawn (Gray et al. 2014). The purpose of this
report is to review the accident, covering the technical and non-technical issues that were
associated with the disaster. It critically evaluates the variety of poor engineering design
which resulted in the accident. Further, it explains the inherent risks associated with the crude
oil and lastly, it concludes the report.