Member Info for adoubleuk

Albi1,

" I wonder how many musicians, lyricists and standups are hiding undercover here ..."

Many, I suspect.

How about adding people not unfamiliar to the Grampian are to the list, while you're at it? Plus caving, truckracing, freelance journalism and working in the oilfield?

Subtract 'standup', though. They're the comedians who only appear on this BB during 'office hours', tell us what the SP is going to do, don't have a clue what Hurricane's about, and go quiet once their train has finally reached the suburbs.

I wouldn't touch Genel with a long bargepole.

But they know why, and so do I.

chrishutch,

"Notice there is lots of noise regarding Big Rig arrival at West Newton."

But nobody's yet answered my query about what and whose rig it'll be! Waaah! And for sure it won't be a 'big rig'. Heck, I once worked on a rig so big we had to lower the mast every night to let the Moon go past...

(Cue 'big rig stories from anyffellow 'oilfield trash on this BB).

mrJimV,

"Could well go up past a billion soon enough, we are coming into March tomorrow not only HUR going to start pumping the oil once they get the new rope , Spirit Energy will be drilling soon , hell of a lot going on this years with operations, also a hell of a lot of investors watching this share ."

Although I personally agree with the overall (upbeat!) thrust of your post, it contains an inaccuracy which must be corrected. Please forgive me for doing so.

No, they won't. Hurricane Energy will be drilling soon, first with the appraisal well on Lincoln, to be maybe tied-in eventually to the Lancaster FPSO, though it'll be DST'd first, and then 'exploring' Warwick. Sorting out the GWA licences, at long last.

This will be straw-bossed in the field by Petrofac as in previous campaigns, under whose name the required permits have already been obtained, but under Hurricane's oversight as lease-holder and 'operator'.

All Spirit Energy will be doing is signing the cheques, although naturally they'll be kept in copy on the daily drilling reports.

I'm aware that some posters here aren't happy with the 'Spirit deal', but nevertheless without them signing those all-important cheques, Hurricane probably wouldn't be drilling GWA this year.

fitguy5 (and Ilikesalmon),

"So fae Banchory then......I guess we might of crossed paths at some point then...."

Oh crikey, how many of us may have met up in the past? 'Cos way back when I lived close to Banchory (Finzean) before moving up to Donside, (up in the hills beyond Alford) which is a far more civilized place, if wilder...

Lady Sonia,

"Not even going to mention the "R" word."

This is probably a good idea, given that when one googles your pseudonym, on comes up with some starting results.

We've enough on our plate with amourous giant squid (and possibly seahorses, with camels not being exluded), without bondage entering the mix.

By the way, recent information recieved inplies that the rope may originate from Canada. Though some guesswork there...

bartlebobton,

"Only recently read, there are small colonies of seahorses off the coast of Dorset... pretty amazing..."

Guess you must be in RBD as well, then?

Did you read the absurd thing in the Times today (but with a very sensible reply from the local tourist board at the end). Hey, if the tourists on the beaches can get sunstroke, why not a coule of dolphins?

Seahorses are dead cool. Unique in the fishy world.

SIPP,

" have a Cadbury's Caramel"

Isn't that a Cadbury's Camel?

Oh no! I've been reading too many of Escargot's posts, I suppose.

Time to smoke a final Caramel Filter before bed...

Wellwell,

Coming back to your post (which I 'ticked').

"and on the pic of the buoy suspended in DDD you can see 3 of the riser slots have connectors whilst the others are flanged off. (The 3 could be 2 x GLA and 1 GWA slot for the farm-in although of course we have been guided that there was no work done in Dubai in this regard).

A good 'spot' on the connectors. But your second phrase is a bit misleading, imho.

The buoy is obviously set up for a third well connection. But the buoy was built and set off north on the heavy-lift waay before the Spirit deal was announced. And will have been designed-in a long time before even that.

Your post implies that there was a 'delay' in the sailing of the FPSO due to 'additional work' being done relative to the farmout. However information received from Lower Easham assures those people who can be bothered to occasionally communicate with company HQ indicates that this was not the case.

Of course, this is just a BB where anyone can post, taking things at face value or not, believing innuendo or otherwise, and so on. But I'd submit that innuendo (however well-veiled) is nothing but that.

And is that what they were picking up in Algecieras?

daltry,

"This site is piously dedicated to the Cathedral of Rope!"

Is this where you mean? Could that be the old rope from the last hookup attempt? And the remains of the winch?

https://www.tripadvisor.co.za/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187493-d240486-i104304518-New_Cathedral_Catedral_Nueva-Salamanca_Province_of_Salamanca_Castile_and_.html

laser,

"would think its mainly pressure and leak testing ,setting up instruments samples of fluids flushing of the flowlines would not think major re-designed parts are involved"

I 'ticked' your post, mate, but I think there will be a lot more to it than that. Because certain parts of the entire 'system' have not yet been interfaced together and seen to be properly 'talking to each other'. I'm thinking particularly of the control systems, such as the Technip ones for the wellheads and the electrical ones for the ESP's, which were installed in Dubai. Sure, individually they should be ready to go, but given their complexity they will need to be completely checked-out for minor glitches (almost certain to happen!) to ensure they'll work reliably in the months and years to come.

Please don't consider this as criticism of your post, but nothing involved is quite 'plug and play'. If commissioning takes just three weeks I'll be happy (especially if FoiL is announced as taking place on the 31st!), but won't be screaming 'delay' if it takes longer.

PS Pardon typo's btw!

ulbert,

This my reply, but bear in mind it's personal opinion only.

"My question is; Is this process "simply" the gradual bringing on-stream of an already fully-tested, primed and proven system, or is the commissioning process partly suck-it-and-see and to some degree a live test?

I know Aoka Mizu has already proven her worthiness and suitability for this job and this type of hydrocarbon in a previous role, and has had a refurbishment & re-fit. She is clearly a well-proven tool for the job.

I'm just not clear to what extent the commissioning process can produce issues which need to be solved "in the field" as it were. For example, are last minute changes and fitting of replacement/re-designed parts a normal part of the process or is the system expected to work 100% as is?"

'Last minute changes' shouldn't be required. Hoever, the entire downhole / SURF / production facility haven't been 'tested' together as an integrated system transporting live hydrocarbons under pressure all the way to the boat's storage tanks. So minor problems can be expected to occur, possibly requiring replacement parts. But nothing major. For instance, although the production train will have been fully pressure-tested in Dubai, that's a static test. In dynamic conditions, there are temperature changes and so on, so a leaky flange might be found, or things like that.

But nothing which would require re-design. I don't think anyone in the commissioning team will be expecting 100% perfect straight off the bat. In fact that's hat commissioning is all about on projects like this. Identifying and sorting out wrinkles.

" 3 of the riser slots have connectors whilst the others are flanged off. "

Well spotted, Wellwell!

DC,

Fine, just wanted to be sure we were talking about the same thing! I agree, that looks like our puppy. From which some conclusions can be reached, answering vast speculation posted weeks ago.

1 The rope is synthetic, not wire. This also goes a long way to explain why it's a specially-made item, not an off-the-shelf job.

2 It is carried on the FPSO, not pre-fixed to the buoy.

It also makes me think that maybe (just maybe) the recent manoevers MIGHT have been involved with spooling on a new rope, in which case we're ready to go, and the 'weatherwatchers' might be back in business again!

DC,

OK, that's the only picture of the turret I could find, as well.

Where's the winch? Or do you reckon it's that half-visible, well-hidden yellow thing?

DC,

"Interesting new photo in the gallery which shows the structure above the turret with what looks very much like a winch central above the turret."

Where (relative to others in the gallery) is this picture? I can't find anything like that.

This should be listened to from the start, because it kicks off with Brian Larkin of UOG, which also has interests in Colter. He explains why the initial borehole stayed on the 'Colter South' side of the fault, and why a sidetrack will now be done.

fitguy5,

"Rope must have failed within a few metres of the buoy as it was when it was about to be latched!"

Not necessarily. The thing is, we know essentially nothing about the 'pull-in' system on the FPSO. I was hoping McGee' might have been able to enlighten us on this, but he hasn't. I've tried to research the thing, bit with no success. Who is sure that a winch is involved? It coould equally be an incremental 'gripper system', or something else, such as is used on coiled-tubing or equally for laying subsea pipelines.

The rope may have 'failed' 20m above where it's attached to the buoy, but without an engineering drawing, nor having visited the boat, I just don't know.