BP internal report: Spreading the blame to ‘multiple companies’

With impeccable timing, oil giant BP has released results of an internal investigation over its Deepwater Horizon debacle in the Gulf of Mexico, an investigation determining the tragedy resulted from “a complex and interlinked” series of failures.

BP has published results of its internal investigation into its most recent environmental catastrophe, the Deepwater Horizon incident in the Gulf of Mexico, and predictably has spread the blame to “multiple companies and work teams” who all contributed to the devastating nightmare, seemingly defying any checks and balances that “multiple companies and work teams” might bring to a project of such magnitude. A press release issued by the oil company on Wednesday states: “No single factor caused the Macondo well tragedy.” Rather, “a sequence of failures involving a number of different parties led to the explosion and fire which killed 11 people and caused widespread pollution in the Gulf of Mexico earlier this year.” The accident investigation team was led by Mark Bly, BP Group Head of Safety and Operations, and was requested within 24 hours of the accident. The team was asked to “identify critical factors and their underlying causes in order to make appropriate recommendations.” The 193-page report, available on the company’s website, comes on the heels of retrieval of the rig’s blowout preventer, a critical piece of evidence in the crime, from the ocean floor last Saturday. It is reported that a NASA facility in Louisiana will be used to analyze the blowout preventer. While the company's report indicates it is based on information available to the investigation team at the time of the investigation and that, at times, “the evidence available to the investigation team was contradictory, unclear or uncorroborated,” it added that “the investigation team did not seek to make credibility determinations in such cases.” Rarely mentioned throughout an ordeal that began with an off-shore explosion on April 20 is Halliburton. However, the report goes into great detail regarding the secretive company once run by former vice-president Dick Cheney. It notes Halliburton failed to cooperate in the internal investigation, stating: “At the time this report was written, Halliburton had declined the investigation team’s requests for equivalent samples of the cement components used on the rig.” Thus, Halliburton’s failure to cooperate with BP did not allow the investigation team to conduct tests on any of Halliburton’s products. BP’s sources for data “derived from rig-sourced components are the lab test reports received from Halliburton.” Regarding Halliburton’s lab test results on slurry tests dated April 12, 2010, BP notes several discrepancies. Among them, Halliburton indicated in subsequent correspondence that the initial document dated April 12, 2010 contained results from slurry tests conducted on April 18, 2010. Additionally, “some of the data provided appeared to pre-date the April 18, 2010, slurry testing.” Commenting on the company report, BP’s gone-but-not-forgotten chief executive Tony Hayward said: “The investigation report provides critical new information on the causes of this terrible accident. It is evident that a series of complex events, rather than a single mistake or failure, led to the tragedy. Multiple parties, including BP, Halliburton and Transocean, were involved.” Also commenting on the internal report, Hayward’s replacement, Bob Dudley, said: “We have said from the beginning that the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon was a shared responsibility among many entities.” He added that his company’s internal investigation makes that conclusion “even clearer.” In all, the report clearly paints a circle of confusion as the blame game continues in what will eventually prove to be an egregious assault on the food chain.