A Win For The People Of The Gulf [Reader Post]

Greg, the maximum control comes from humans being able to be more hands on instead of using ROVs. This has been delicate work, having to be achieved using a singular dimension media (cameras), and in that aspect, what they have accomplished thus far at this depth still boggles the mind.

So it would depend upon the technology of a manned submersible, and the how it can be equipped for operating at these depths for these tasks. They’ve had as record for as deep as 35,000, and many work quite well in the 5000 ft depth as well. Our military submarines are about 2500 ft, but the smaller manned submersibles achieve much greater depths. Any, however, would have to be rigged with the necessary arms and load capacity it would take for repairs of an ultra deepwater well. The submersible would have to be designed in mind for that weight, size and flexibility.

The Seamagine has their Ocean Pearl two man sub operating at 300 ft depths, but the their three man Triumps is rated at 1500 ft. Then there’s the Undersea Hunter that’s anywhere from 500 ft to 1500 ft.

Strikes me as it’s a great time for deepwater manned submersibles to retrofit subs for their subsea vehicles for this of work… provided Obama doesn’t destroy the industry in the interim.

The average well is the Gulf is about 35 meters, or 114.8 ft. In fact, the Ixtoc was only 160 ft, I believe. But then, that was four decades ago, and the industry has made leaps and bounds in advances since then. Of course, the enviros whine about the shallow depths as well because these lines can then be ruptured by shipping traffic. Then there’s that nasty detail that shallow wells are closer to the shore line, which make the more expensive shore clean up more intense since it doesn’t have miles of ocean (and rising from the depths) to disperse before hitting the shore lines. It’s always something with those who simply detest inexpensive energy from oil.

Actually, there’s only been one report on the logistics I’ve seen on this, Greg. Most have been running willy nilly off into LaLa land, like this is working on your refrigerator in the back yard. Between the pressure on that well, and the depths where men cannot actually physically work in submersibles (at least at this point….), it’s almost more challenging than sending a robotic mini four wheeler to Mars.

But the article I had archived a few weeks back was from by Peter Spotts at the CSMonitor, and appeared at the KPLC TV site. I wondered what took so long for anyone to figure out the obvious….

One major challenge is logistics — moving hardware on the surface to the seafloor. That process often involves building a drill pipe first. To do that, rig workers must assemble the pipe one 90-foot section at a time in a stop-start sequence — lowering the assembly another 90 feet into the water with each new segment. To get to the depth of the wellhead they must assemble and carefully lower at least 55 segments.

“It’s not that the task is more complicated; it just takes a long time to do it,” he says.

At depth, the remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) take over.

They weigh anywhere from 1,000 pounds to five tons and have two arms. One is capable of coarse movements and is used to grasp claw-holds on undersea hardware. The other is capable of the full range of movement of a human arm and can grip with either a light touch or something more viselike as the situation demands.

A heavily armored cable lowers the craft close to its working area. The craft then moves out of a protective cage but remains linked to the surface through another 300 to 500 feet of softer umbilical cable.

An ROV may have from two to four video cameras to help the pilot guide the vehicle. But it’s up to the pilot to mentally convert the two-dimensional images on the screen into three dimensions to estimate how far an object is from the ROV, says Knute Brekke, who spent 11 years as a diver and ROV pilot working on oil rigs in the Gulf before moving to the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California.

If an operator moves a vehicle too close to the bottom, the ROV’s thrusters stir up sediment, which cuts visibility. If an operator loses track of where the ROV’s umbilical is, the cable can become tangled. Often, two or three ROVs are operating at once, demanding intense focus.

Movements typically are slow and deliberate, just as those of astronauts during spacewalks. The ROVs are neutrally buoyant; left to their own devices, they hover. If an operator accelerates the ROV too quickly, the craft’s mass will ensure it keeps moving long after the thrusters stop. The operators also have to compensate for sea currents and — at the Deepwater Horizon site — navigate around wreckage.

While not a perfect analogy, operating an ROV is a bit like playing a computer game with a partner, says Mr. Brekke. The pilot runs the ROV, while the copilot operates the arms.

Your visual makes me laugh… everyone sitting around in 3D helmets. LOL Nope, not quite. And these ROVs are also the reason that the cap is off now… one of these suckers hit it. That dimension problem again.

It’s just not like “being there”.