Oil Rig Crewmembers leaped eight stories into the Gulf of Mexico as flames engulfed the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling rig, according to gripping testimony Tuesday during a federal hearing into last month’s disaster. Testimony revealed that nearby ships raced to the scene unfolding 50 miles offshore as the crew of a solitary supply boat plucked survivors from burning water.
The captain and crew of the Damon B. Bankston spoke of how they scrambled to save oil rig workers and coordinate rescue efforts. A Coast Guard official described doctors on the decks of rocking boats desperately performing triage of the burned and injured, and a four-day round-the-clock search that covered 5,300 square miles.
The meeting also led to legal arguments among several companies with potential liability, including BP, which owns the oil lease; Transocean, which owns the rig; Halliburton, which applied the cement that is suspected of being a factor in the explosion; and Cameron, which manufactured the blowout preventer atop the well, which seems to have failed.
Alwin Landry, the captain of the Damon B. Bankston, a supply boat alongside the oil rig, said he heard and felt an explosion and saw a green flash and heard a hissing sound on the drilling platform Deepwater Horizon. Debris began to hit his boat, and as he moved away from the burning platform, he saw three men jump into the sea. He ordered his boat’s rescue vessel to pick up anyone in the water.
The Bankston’s rescue crew picked up men from a debris field around the rig, in one instance pulling them aboard while oil burned nearby on the water’s surface. The crew also saved several deck hands who had abandoned the rig but found themselves in a life raft tied to the sinking structure. The crew of the rescue boat cut the raft free and, with men in the water clinging to the side of the raft, towed it back to the larger ship.
The Bankston was credited with recovering or taking aboard all 115 survivors, including Curt Kuchta, the captain of the Horizon.
Landry said he had a brief conversation with the captain. “They said they pressed the kill switch, didn’t know if it worked or not,” he said.
That detail was of great interest to the attorneys present, as it seemed to suggest a failure of the blowout preventer designed to keep oil and gas from erupting out of the wellhead.
