SPE 53974

Killing Methods and Consequences of 1120 Gulf Coast Blowouts During 1960-1996
Skalle, P./NTNU, Trondheim, Jinjun H./Southwest Petroleum Institute, Nanchong, Podio, A.L./UT, Austin

Copyright 1999, Society of Petroleum Engineers Inc.

This paper was prepared for presentation at the 1999 SPE Latin American and Caribbean
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Abstract
This paper focuses on what happened after wells are out of
control by analyzing statistically a database that contains
about 1120 blowout events from the Gulf Coast and adjoining
states covering the period 1960-1996. The trends are
extracted, including blowing fluid type, mode of control,
duration of blowout, pollution, fire and explosion, and
fatalities. Detailed differences between Outer Continental
shelf (OCS) and Texas are given. A report form of blowout
events is recommended in order to improve the data quality
and standardize reporting.
Introduction
Drilling engineers and fire-fighting specialists never stop
investigating blowouts because of the cost of blowouts, the
loss of life and pollution incurred from blowouts. One logical
counter measure is to analyze statistical data, revealed the
weakest points and attack them. Blowout databases have been
developed to extract trends from blowout events since 1990.
Kato and Adams set up a database containing 905 blowouts
and analyzed the trends1,2. Their data were mainly collected
from Alberta, Canada, Texas, USA, and the Gulf of Mexico.
They investigated statistically the pollution possibilities from
blowouts, causes, duration and kill methods. Danenberger3 put
special attention to Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) drilling
Blowouts by 87 events from 1971-1991. He found that most of
blowouts were attributable to shallow gas influx, and were of
short duration.
Hughes, Podio and Sepehrnoori4 initially developed a
database in 1990, which is updated regularly. The data are
mainly from Texas, OCS as well as Louisiana. This database
contains almost all blowouts in Texas and OCS. Partial
trends were extracted from the updated database in a previous
paper5, including blowout depth, blowout causes, operation in

progress and etc. Present paper is a follow up of a recent

paper, which focuses on what happened after the blowouts
were underway.
The updated database contains 1120 blowout events from
the period between 1960 and 1996, geographically distributed
as follows: 826 in Texas, and 187 in the Outer Continental
Shelf (OCS). The remaining 110 from Louisiana, Mississippi
and Alabama are incomplete and not included in this paper.
Five agencies contributed the blowout data: State Oil and Gas
Board of Alabama, Louisiana Office of Concervation,
Mississippi State Oil and Gas Board, Texas Railroad
Commission (RRC) and Minerals Management Service
(MMS.).
This article analyses the following aspects: blowing fluid
type, mode of control, blowout duration, pollution, fire and
explosion, and fatalities.
No systematic method to report blowout existed before
1973. Although it has been mandatory to report the events in
United States since 1973, a more detailed and standard
reporting is needed, and a blowout report form is
recommended.
Blowing Fluid Type
The blowing fluids are categorized into 11 groups as shown in
Table 1. Shallow gas is defined as gas which comes from
depths shallower than 2000 ft or for wells with the last casing
set at only 200 ft. There are 22 wells (2.7%) and 6 wells
(3.2%) where fluid type are missing in Texas and OCS
respectively.
Pure gas blowouts account for 76.4% in OCS, including
57.7% gas and 18.7% shallow gas. Flow of liquids occur in
10.6 % blowouts, and 9.6% events compound to a mixture of
Gas and liquids. In Texas, the blowout occurrences caused by
pure gas (as well as shallow gas), liquids, and mixtures of gas
and liquids are 50.3%, 8% and 39%, respectively. Obviously,
gas is by far the most dangerous kick medium. It is noted that
89.3% and 86% of the blowouts contain gas in some forms in
Texas and OCS.
Figure 1 shows the clear difference in fluid types between
OCS and Texas. It is apparent that there are more dangerous
gas blowouts in OCS than in Texas. Especially in OCS exist
35 (18.7%) shallow gas events, but only 2 wells (0.2%) in
Texas. It is only in OCS that oil blowouts (9 wells, 4.8%) and
condensate blowouts (7 wells, 3.7%) were reported. In Texas
occurrences are characterized by 198 wells (24%) blowing

SKALLE, P., JINJUN, H., PODIO, A.L.

mixtures of gas and water, as well as 3.6% mud. This

difference is real, but partly caused by an imprecise reporting
form.
Mode of Control
Blowout control methods are divided into 8 categories:
Collapse of open hole wellbore (Bridging), Closing the
blowout preventer (BOP), Pumping Cement slurry (Cement),
Capping, Depletion of small reservoirs, Install equipment,
Pumping Mud, and Drilling Relief wells. Figure 2 and 3 give
the modes of control in OCS and Texas respectively.
Figure 4 compares the two areas. In OCS, bridging is the
most common control of blowouts with 39.6%. Killing with
weighted mud ranks second with 19%. In Texas, mud is the
favorite method, accounting for 41% of total killing events,
while bridging ranges second with 19%. 11% of Blowouts
were killed by means of cement in both areas. Other modes
of control such as BOP, depletion, install equipment and
relief well, have almost same importance in OCS and Texas.
Duration
Blowout duration has a wide range from 0.0 to 10800 hours
(about one and half years) according to the database. Figure 5
shows the proportion of blowouts vs duration. In OCS, 12%
more occurrences (15%-3%) than in Texas ceased in less
than one hour, which means that significantly more blowouts
were controlled quicker in OCS. A little bit more blowouts
lasted in 1-24 hours in Texas than in OCS. Only about 4% of
blowouts continued blowing in more than one month in both
areas.
A cumulative percentage of blowouts vs duration is
shown in Figure 6. Suffice it to say that the majority of the
events were of short duration. 52.4 % and 44.9 % of the
occurrences were controlled in one day or less in OCS and in
Texas respectively, which demonstrated that duration in OCS
was obviously shorter than in Texas. About 80% of blowouts
stopped blowing in one week or less. In other words, only 20
% of blowouts continued blowing after one week.
Some record about formations in which blowouts
occurred. It is, however, only in Texas where enough records
are available to extract trends statistically (see Table 2). In
Texas, 189 blowout events took place reportedly in sand, 80
in lime and 11 in other rocks. The further studies are made in
sand and lime.
Table 3 and Figure 7 give the duration distribution in
different rocks. Totally 51.1% of events ceased in less than
24 hours in sand, but only 43% in lime.
Table 4 and 5 and Figure 8 show the relationship
between duration and depth in two rocks. In sand, average
duration of blowouts increases with depth. In shallow
formation (< 1000 ft), the average duration is 58 hours. The
average duration is 519.6 hours for each blowout when the
depth is over 10000 ft.
By comparison, the correlation in lime is not as clear as in
sand. A partial reason may be the relative shortage of data in
lime. In the column of < 1000 ft, there was only one record
with a blowout of 300 hours. Blowouts happening in the

SPE 53974

depth from 1000-2500 ft lasted in average 19.5 hours. At the

average depth of 4067 ft, the average blowing period was
114.9 hours. When the depth was over 10000 ft, the duration
was 83 hours without counting the longest duration of 10800
hours.
Pollution
Blowout pollution is divided in 4 levels according to the
spills: Enormous (>10000 bbls), Large (10000 bbls), medial
(1000 bbls) and Small (100 bbls). Statistics are shown in
Table 6. Pollution Rate is defined as number of pollution
cases in 100 blowouts. It is clearly shown that 17.6%
pollution rate is highest in OCS, while only 7.5% in Texas.
As regard to the pollution size, most cases (24 of 33 in OCS,
44 of 62 in Texas, and 9 of 14 in Louisiana) are among the
small size. Only in OCS we found cases (2) of enormous
size in which spills are over 10000 bbls. It is concluded that
blowouts in OCS have a higher risk of polluting the
environment than in Texas.
Besides oil, hydrogen sulfide (H2S) is dangerous as an air
pollutant. So far, there have been only 9 cases of blowouts in
Texas that contained reportedly H2S. The concentration of
H2S ranged from 300 PPM to 12,000 PPM. The data are not
enough to obtain trends. More attention should be paid to
H2S pollution.
According to data available, pollution rates are low and
pollution sizes are small in all three investigated areas. The
same conclusion as Kato1 can be reached that a low
probability exists for a blowout resulting in pollution.
Fire and Explosion
In some cases, blowout may cause fire and explosions,
especially in gas blowouts. Table 7 gives the number of
blowouts with fire or explosion in 3 areas. In the last column
is the term, Fire Rate, which is defined as number of fire and
explosion in each 100 blowouts (usually explosion incurs
fire). Fire rate in OCS was 6.95%, which is twice as high as
in Texas or in Louisiana. The main reason may be much
higher percentage of gas (including shallow gas) blowouts as
mentioned in Table 1.
As the fire is dangerous to personnel and equipment, it is
predicted that blowouts in OCS is much easier to cause loss
of life than in Texas and in Louisiana, which has been
demonstrated by the past casualties shown in Table 8.
Fatalities
Table 8 gives the data about deaths associated with blowout
disasters. In OCS, 65 people died from 11 blowout events. It
was gas blowouts that caused 60 fatalities. Oil rushing out
from wellbore caused 4 persons to die. Therefore, gas
blowing was extremely dangerous in OCS and contingency
planning should be improved.
In Texas, 14 casualties resulted from 9 blowouts. 4 people
unfortunately died of blowing gas, while 10 deaths were from
the mixture of gas and oil / gas and water.
Number of fatalities in OCS was more than triple
compared to Texas although the total number of blowouts

SPE 53974

KILLING METHODS AND CONSEQUENCES OF 1120 GUL COAST BLOWOUTS DURING 1960-1996

was less than one forth of the number of blowouts in Texas.

The observed trend that blowout events in OCS was much
likely to cause casualties than in Texas is partly explained
through the higher fire rate (especially explosion) in OCS.
Figure 9 compares the number of death during different
decades. 34 people died of blowouts in the 1960's. The
fatalities decreased to 14 in the 1970s. The number of deaths
increased again during 1980-1989 because the number of
wells drilled were at a peak. A decreasing trend in fatalities
is seen over the 36 years period. This trend we believe is
caused by ever improving alertness precautions. May this
trend continue!
Blowout reporting
Today, all blowouts (and kicks) are reported to official
agencies, e.g., The Railroad Commission (RRC) in Texas.
But the different reporting forms are designed to meet special
needs. The RRC puts their emphasis on safety and surface
pollution. No reporting form is designed to really find the
detailed reasons behind the accidents. Useful information was
lost forever, although it could have been included in the
reporting form with no much extra effort. Therefore a
worldwide acceptable Blowout Reporting Form is suggested,
as shown in the Appendix. Its main objective is to save
valuable information for future investigation.
Conclusion
Following conclusions can be drawn from this analysis:
1. Two thirds of fluids rushing out of well were pure gas
in OCS; by contrast, about 50% of the blowout were gas in
Texas, while 39% were a mixture of gas and liquids.
2. The dominating method of controlling OCS blowouts
was bridging (39.6%), while weighted mud and cement
slurries accounted totally for 29% of killing events; In Texas,
weighted fluids have been the prior method to control
blowouts (40%); Bridging and cement rank the second and
the third with 16% and 10.6% respectively.
3. About one half of all blowouts ceased in less than one
day while only 20% of all blowouts continued blowing for
more than one week. The duration in sand is a little bit
longer than in lime. Duration of blowouts seem to increase
with drilled depth.
4. A low probability exists for pollution resulting from
blowout; Pollution rate and fire rate in OCS were
significantly higher than in Texas. Although casualties are
decreasing and fire rate is low, an ever improving
contingency planning should be worked out to further reduce
the probability and to guarantee personnel safety.
5. A Blowout Reporting Form is suggested.
Nomenclature
Subscript
AV
= average
BO
= blowout
BOP
= blowout Preventer
COND = condensate
DURA = duration

GOW
GW
OW
OCS
No
ShG

= gas plus oil plus water

= gas plus water
= oil plus water
= outer continental shelf
= number
= shallow gas

Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank Belinda Wolf at the Texas
Railroad Commission for granting us access to all the
compiled files of blowouts in Texas. Thanks are also given to
following agencies: State Oil and Gas Board of Alabama,
Louisiana Office of Concervation, Mississippi State Oil and
Gas Board, Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) and Minerals
Management Service (MMS) (OCS).
References
1. Kato S. and Adams N.J., Quantitative Assessment of
Blowout Data as It Relate to Pollution Potential, paper
SPE 23289 presented at the First International Conference
on Health, Safety and Environment, The Hague, The
Netherlands, November 10-14,1991.
2. Adam N.J. and Kuhlman L.G., What Can Go Wrong
and How To Deal With It: One Companys Experiences,
paper OTC 7099 presented at the 25th Annual OTC,
Houston, Texas, May 3-6, 1993.
3. Danenberger E.P., Outer Continental Shelf Drilling
Blowouts, 1971-1991, paper OTC 7248 presented at the
25th Annual OTC, Houston, Texas, May 3-6, 1993.
4. Hughes V.M.P., Podio A.L., and Sepehrnoori K.,
Computer-Assisted Analysis of Trends Among Gulf
Coast Blowouts, In Situ, 14(2)(1990)201-228.
5. Skalle P. and Podio A.L., Trends Extracted from 1200
Gulf Coast Blowouts During 1960-1996, paper SPE
39354 presented at the IADC/SPE Drilling Conference,
Dallas, USA, March 3-6,1998.

SKALLE, P., JINJUN, H., PODIO, A.L.

SPE 53974

Table 1. Number of Blowouts With Different Blowing Fluids

FLUID TYPE
TEXAS
%
OCS
%
GAS
414
50.1
108
57.7
SHALLOW GAS
2
0.2
35
18.7
GAS+OIL
76
9.2
14
7.5
GAS+WATER
198
24.0
4
2.1
GAS+COND
19
2.4
GAS+OIL+WATER
28
3.4
COND
7
3.7
OIL
9
4.8
OIL+WATER
6
0.7
WATER
31
3.7
3
1.6
MUD
30
3.6
1
0.5
MISSING DATA
22
2.7
6
3.2
TOTAL
826
100
187
100
Table 2. Number of Blowouts in Rocks
ROCK TYPE
SAND
TEXAS
189
OCS
10
LOUISIANA
7

LIME
80

Table 3. Duration Distribution in Rocks in Texas

DURATION
0- 1 hr
1-24 hr
No.of BO in Sand
5
89
%
2.7
48.4
No.of BO in Lime
2
32
%
2.5
40.5

1-2 days
32
17.4
18
22.8

2-3 days
15
8.2
7
8.9

3-7 days
15
8.2
8
10.1

Table 4. Duration vs Depth in Sand in Texas

DEPTH
kft
< 1 hr
1.0-2.5
No. of BO
9
29
AV DEPTH ft
549
1784
AV DURA hr
58
120

2.5-5.0
54
3680
82.6

5.0-10
54
7110
238.6

> 10

2.5-5.0
23
4067
114.9

5.0-10
23
7540
52

Table 5. Duration vs Depth in Lime in Texas

DEPTH kft
< 1 hr
1.0-2.5
No. of BO
1
7
AV DEPTH ft
316
1754
AV DURA hr
300
19.5

7-30days
15
8.2
7
8.9

>30 days

9
4.8
3
3.8

24
12400
519.6

> 10

22
12120
83

Consequences of Blowout Events

Table 6. No. of Blowouts with Pollution Size
POLLUTION
ENORMOUS
LARGE
MEDIAL
SMALL
SIZE
(>10000bbls)
(10000bbls)
(1000bbls)
( 100bbls)
TEXAS
5
13
44
OCS
2
4
3
24
LOUISIANA
5
9
Pollution Rate = Number of pollution cases / Number of blowouts 100 (%)

TOTAL
CASES
62
33
14

POLLUTION
RATE %
7.5
17.6
14.5

SPE 53974

KILLING METHODS AND CONSEQUENCES OF 1120 GUL COAST BLOWOUTS DURING 1960-1996

Table 7. Number of Blowouts with Fire and Explosion

LOCATION
FIRE
EXPLOSION
FIRE RATE %
TEXAS
21
6
3.27
OCS
4
9
6.95
LOUISIANA
2
1
3.15
Fire Rate = Number of fire and explosion/Number of blowouts100 (%)
Table 8. Fatalities Caused by Blowing Fluids
BLOWING FLUIDS
OCS
No. of Disasters
GAS
9
GAS+OIL
1
GAS+WATER
OIL
1
TOTAL
11

Fatalities
60
1
4
65

TEXAS
No. of Disasters
Fatalities
4
4
3
7
2
3
9

14

SKALLE, P., JINJUN, H., PODIO, A.L.

OCS
Texas

BLOWOUT %

60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Gas

ShG

G+Cond

Oil

FLUID TYPE

Figure1 Blowing Fluids in Texas and OCS

missing
Relief well 5%
3%

Mud
41%

Bridging
16%

BOP
9%
cement
11%
Capping
Install Depletion4%
equipment 5%
6%

Figure 2 Kill Methods Applied to Texas

missing
Relief well
3%
5
%
Mud

Bridging
39 %

19 %
Install
equipment
5 %Depletioncement
9%
11 %

BOP
9%

Figure 3 Kill Methods Applied to OCS

SPE 53974

SPE 53974

KILLING METHODS AND CONSEQUENCES OF 1120 GUL COAST BLOWOUTS DURING 1960-1996

missing

Relief well

Mud

Install equipment

Depletion
Texas
OCS

Capping

cement

BOP

Bridging
0

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

PERCENTAGE OF KILL METHODS

Figure 4 Comparison of Kill Methods Between Texas and OCS

45
40
OCS

PERCENTAGE

35

Texas

30
25
20
15
10
5
0
0-1 hr

1-3
days

1week1month
DURATION

Figure 5 Blowout Duration

miss
data

45

SKALLE, P., JINJUN, H., PODIO, A.L.

CUMULATIVE PERCENTAG

100
90
80
70
60
50

OCS

40

Texas

30
20
10
0
1 hr.

3 days
DURATION

1
month

Figure 6 Blowout Duration

60

PERCENTAGE %

50

Lime
Sand

40
30
20
10
0
0-1 hr

1-2
days

3-7
days

over
30days

DURATION

Figure 7 Duration in Sand and Lime In Texas

SPE 53974

SPE 53974

KILLING METHODS AND CONSEQUENCES OF 1120 GUL COAST BLOWOUTS DURING 1960-1996

lime

500

sand

400
300
200
100
0
0

5000

10000

15000

AVERAGE DEPTH

Figure 8 Duration vs Depth

No. of Fatalities per 10000

wells drilled

AVERAGE DURATION

600

3
2,5
2
1,5
1
0,5
0
1960s

1970s

1980s

1990s

YEAR

Figure 9 Fatalities vs Decades

10

SKALLE, P., JINJUN, H., PODIO, A.L.

Appendix:

BLOWOUT REPORT FORM: PAGE 1: Before blowout

REPORT DATE
Date of Blowout

NAME OF REPORTER

RIG TYPE
Land rig
Drilling ship
Semisub
Juckup
+?

TEL. No.
e-mail:

WELL LOCATION
County /Block
Operator

OPERATION IN PROGRESS
Eploratory Drilling
Development Drilling

O
O
O

SPE 53974

O Actual drilling
Coring
O Circulation
Well testing O Other
Trip out

Completion

O WOC O Nipple Down BOP

O Running well equipment
O Well testing O Other
Production

O Gas production O Oil production

O Closed in well O Other

Field
Contractor
Water Depth:

Well Number
Well Name

SURFACE
EQUIPMENT OF
INTEREST

MD of last casing
TVD of last casing
Size of last casing
MD of well
Inclination at Bottom
Bit size
Mud weight
Name of formation
Formation Type

Sand

O Lime

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF
OPERATION IN PROGRESS

Work Over

O Pull tubing
O Runing tubing
O Pull/Drill out well plugs
O Install BOP
O Other

X-mas tree

REASONS FOR KICK (PRIMARY BARRIER)

O Swabbing
O Fmtn Breakdown

OGeopressure OLow mud weight OGas cut mud

OOther

EXPLAIN IN DETAIL:

BOP

SPE 53974

KILLING METHODS AND CONSEQUENCES OF 1120 GUL COAST BLOWOUTS DURING 1960-1996

Appendix:

BLOWOUT REPORT FORM:

BLOWING FLUIDS
gas+
oil+
water+
mud+
condensate
DETAILS?

Release Point of Blowout

Material Losses(US$):

Ignition Delay(hr):
Fire Duration (hr):
Duration of Blowout (hr)
Explosion? Yes /No:
DETAILS?

Fatalities:
Injuries:
Pollution(bbl):
[H2S] (PPM):
DETAILS?

REASONS FOR LOSS OF CONTROL (SECONDARY BARRIER):

O Failed to close BOP O

O BOP not in place
O Fractured at casing shoe

BOP Failed after Closure

O Diverted/choked-no problem

PLEASE EXPLAIN IN DETAIL:

MODE of KILLING the WELL: Please explain in detail

Bridging: O Passive

O Active
Kill with weighted mud: O Mud Density
Kill with cement slurry: O Slurry Density
Depletion
BOP / Diverter:
Capping:
Install Equipment

PAGE 2: After blowout

11