Narrator: April 20, 2010. 9:49 pm.
The deepwater horizon oil rig
Explodes in the gulf of mexico.
Oil pours out uncontrolled.
Ltd russel l. Honore: 87 days that
Well spewed oil into the gulf.
Sambhav sankar: This was without any doubt the largest oil spill
Disaster of modern times.
Narrator: How could a catastrophe
On this scale happen?
Antonia judhasz: It soiled 700 miles worth of coast.
It killed countless species.
It sickened tens of thousands, if not more, people.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: The spill had a devastating impact
On our community.
Narrator: We hear from those who survived.
Leo lindner: It's hard to talk about.
Gordon jones, he was going to have a baby.
He and his wife are expecting little max.
The guy was 28 years old.
Narrator: And those who uncovered
The truth behind the disaster.
Steven chu: There were enough early signs
That something was going wrong, but those signs were ignored.
Mark davis: They were engaged in a really high risk undertaking,
And the margins for error were slim.
They gambled, and they lost.
Narrator: The investigators stories reveal a series
Of catastrophic failures.
Richard a. Sears: There were opportunities to get
Control of the situation.
Those opportunities were missed.
Narrator: In-depth analysis and investigative reports
Expose crucial errors.
Mark davis: This had become a faith-based operation.
Ltd russel l. Honore: It does make me angry,
Because that's a failure in leadership,
Which led to a loss of life and a loss of a coastline.
And that's a crying damn shame.
Narrator: Failures of planning transform
An accident into a catastrophe.
Sambhav sankar: Nobody in the oil industry
Had a plan for a deepwater spill of this magnitude
In the gulf of mexico.
Steven chu: President obama said, chu, go down there
And help them stop the leak.
Narrator: The scale of the tragedy is underplayed.
Antonia judhasz: Bp tried to hide how much oil was
Being released from the well.
Narrator: We reveal the 10 fatal steps
That led to the deepwater horizon disaster.
Sambhav sankar: When a billion industry operating a facility
That costs a million dollars a day to run
Takes almost 90 days to stop something from happening,
I can guarantee that the reason is
They're making it up as they go.
[music playing]
Narrator: In 2010, deepwater horizon
Is a high technology billboard for
Cutting edge oil exploration.
It is drilling for oil in water so deep,
It isn't even anchored to the seabed.
Instead it floats in position a mile above the seafloor.
Antonia judhasz: Deepwater drilling
Became the sort of hallmark of the industry,
And still is this technological marvel, this ability
To go anywhere, to the deepest depths of the ocean, basically
The equivalent of space travel to go to these depths to drill.
Narrator: The gulf of mexico is central to bp's plans
To leverage this deep water technology.
Antonia judhasz: The gulf of mexico
Was considered one of the richest oil finds in the world.
The industry was discovering massive oil field
After massive oil field after a massive oil field.
Narrator: The industry brings in hundreds of thousands
Of jobs, many to the indigenous peoples
Of the region, who go on to suffer most in the disaster.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: We have a love-hate relationship
With oil and gas, and that's because of a lot of our people
Also work in the industry.
And so for generations, you were either a fisherman
Or you might have worked for the oil and gas industry.
Narrator: But oil drilling here is
Complex, expensive, and risky.
Yasmine ali: Accidents and incidents were fairly common
In the gulf of mexico.
So about once every two years, something
Would happen but nothing on, quite
On the scale of the deepwater horizon accident.
Narrator: When deepwater horizon explodes,
The oil industry's high tech dream is shattered.
Leo lindner: It was just a torrent of fire
Coming out of the center.
The whole rig was set on fire.
Narrator: A trail of critical mistakes
Leads to this disaster.
In September 2009, seven months before the explosion,
Bp's own safety report recommends suspending
Operations on deepwater horizon until vital safety
Issues are fixed.
But the rig goes back into service
Without fixing all of these issues.
Seven months later, it blows up.
Investigations into the tragedy identify failures
In bp's safety management as a key error
That leads to the disaster.
And bp already has history with exactly this kind of problem.
In 2002, a rig working for bp called the ocean king
Suffers a major accident.
Yasmine ali: On the 8th of August in 2002,
The ocean king experienced a blowout,
And drilling mud went everywhere.
Narrator: At 8:30 in the morning,
Drilling fluid erupts out of the rig's drill pipe.
35 minutes later, highly flammable methane
From a gas pocket 3 and 1/2 thousand feet below the seabed
Bursts out onto the deck.
Yasmine ali: All of the crew were evacuated,
But there was an explosion and fire on that rig.
Narrator: It takes two months and millions of dollars
To repair the ocean king, but then
There is a second accident.
Yasmine ali: Three months after that explosion,
Something similar happened.
So there was gas and mud coming out of the well,
Which looked like the well had failed to seal.
Narrator: Once again, the crew is lucky, and no one dies.
The official response to this double accident
Cites a chain of management and safety failings,
Erroneous chain of decisions, inadequate training
Of personnel, and inadequate planning.
Yasmine ali: There weren't really
Any serious ramifications.
The fine for the ocean king accident was about $41,000
Which is really not very much for an oil and gas company.
Narrator: At the time the fine is issued,
Bp's profits are $32 billion a year.
Yet despite the ocean king incidents,
Seven years later safety failures are
Still slipping through the net.
In September 2009, seven months before the deadly disaster, bp
Runs a safety audit of the deepwater horizon.
It picks up several major maintenance issues
And recommends rig operations are suspended immediately
Until they are fixed.
Yasmine ali: For an installation like the deepwater horizon,
Maintenance is pretty serious.
It's not just like fixing a shelf or changing a light bulb.
These are a lot of safety systems,
So making sure that they're maintained is absolutely vital.
And it's there to protect the people
On that rig and the environment that that rig is in.
Narrator: Five days after the audit,
The rig is put back into service without fixing
All the issues raised.
The audit also notes that one vital piece of safety equipment
Called the blowout preventer is 5 years
Overdue for recertification.
Mark davis: We put things into service more than people want
To know before it's ready, because that's
What the calendar said.
And most of the time, it doesn't go so badly.
Narrator: It's an attitude with a bad track record.
Mark davis: The titanic still had workers on board when it
Set sail on its maiden voyage.
Narrator: But why doesn't the federal regulators
Step in to make sure that critical safety work
Gets done immediately?
That is the next mistake.
Because in reality, one of the world's biggest
Heavy industries isn't being properly regulated
In the gulf of mexico.
Dangerous errors like deepwater horizon safety audit issues
Aren't flagged.
Ltd russel l. Honore: The company was basically operating
Unsupervised by the government.
It was based on trust.
Narrator: April 20, 9:49 pm,
The deepwater horizon drilling rig explodes.
The oil spill that follows becomes
The greatest environmental disaster in us history.
Antonia judhasz: I wasn't surprised to see
A deepwater disaster.
I was very surprised at the scale of what came next.
Narrator: The second mistake on the road to disaster
Can be traced back to weak regulatory oversight of the oil
Industry in the gulf of mexico.
Sambhav sankar: It's very difficult,
As we all know, to plan for the worst
When the worst rarely happens.
But that's the job of a regulatory system,
And we didn't have a functioning regulatory system.
Narrator: Over time like all gulf oil companies,
Bp is drilling further out and in ever deeper water
Chasing huge rewards.
Narrator: But the extreme drilling operations
On rigs like deepwater horizon have changed the landscape
Of oil production.
Mark davis: It's almost more akin to supporting
A space program,
Because people have to live and work in incredibly
Challenging environments.
Narrator: It's a mile down from the free
Floating deepwater horizon just to the sea floor,
And the crew is drilling a further
2 and 1/2 miles into the rock.
So a drill pipe almost the height
Of the tallest mountain in north america
Is hanging off the floating rig.
Sambhav sankar: The technology they were using
On the deepwater horizon was far more
Advanced than the technology used to put people on the moon.
Mark davis: To do the kind of work they do
Requires imagination, a degree of boldness,
And some combination of hubris and romance that most of us
Don't have.
But it also means you can't really trust those people
To make the decisions that are best for you,
Because they're gambling.
Narrator: The body responsible for keeping a lid on this risk
Taking is the us government's minerals management service
Or mms, but by 2010, the changing industry is
Racing ahead of the regulator.
Sambhav sankar: The oil industry's pace
Of technological advancement has been really significant,
And the government simply can't keep up.
Antonia judhasz: The mineral management service
Didn't have the manpower.
They didn't have the expertise.
Ltd russel l. Honore: How can the government have used
A permit to the company and not have the capacity
To observe what they're doing.
Narrator: And there's a fundamental conflict
At the heart of the mms that weakens it even further.
Mark davis: The government that was
Supposed to also be the regulator
Was also making money.
Antonia judhasz: Minerals management service
Did have as its directive trying to bring in as much income as
Possible through the sale of leases,
And its job was really to expand drilling.
Mark davis: It's been the second biggest source of revenue
To the federal treasury after income taxes.
It's big money.
So the minerals management service
Suffered from a multiple personality disorder,
And the pro-production personality
Was the dominant one.
Narrator: This weakness in the mms
Hands a lot of safety regulation to the oil industry
For rigs like deepwater horizon operating in the gulf.
Sambhav sankar: The oil industry operates
With supreme self-confidence in these environments in part
Because so much of what it does happens safely,
Happens without incident.
Mark davis: We proceeded as though
Bad things wouldn't ever occur.
This had become a faith-based operation,
A faith in the industry to have prevented
Bad things from happening.
And they came to, I think, actually
Believe that because it hadn't,
It was because of wisdom and good practice
As opposed to good fortune.
And I love being lucky, but luck's not enough.
Narrator: The mistakes are building.
There have been issues with bp's safety management,
And in the gulf of mexico, no one
Spots or is willing to look at the potential risks
Of operating without proper regulation.
Sambhav sankar: The government does do some inspections,
But they're few and far between, and they're not particularly
Probing or detailed.
Ltd russel l. Honore: 11 people dead, 87 days
Of oil flowing in the gulf.
Now thousands of people are sick from that oil,
Millions of sea life destroyed, no federal inspector on board.
What's wrong with that picture?
Narrator: But the mistakes don't end there.
The oil industry's costs are enormous.
A rig like deepwater horizon costs $1 million a day to run.
Later investigations believe commercial pressure
Plays a critical role in decisions
That lead to the disaster.
Sambhav sankar: So time is money in a very real way.
That time pressure is always a part of every operation.
Leo lindner: The stakes are so high that there is
A constant state of pressure.
It almost becomes like the background.
The constant application of pressure is always there.
Narrator: When disaster strikes, deepwater horizon is drilling
On a site named macondo in the gulf of mexico,
But exploratory drilling is unpredictable,
And the macondo site hasn't been playing ball.
Richard a. Sears: Drilling at macondo prospect
Was over time and over budget.
That happens.
It just happens.
This is the complexity of the earth.
You don't know what to expect.
Antonia judhasz: This is such a difficult well
One of the workers dubbed it the well from hell.
Leo lindner: Yeah, macondo was a particularly rough well.
By the day of the disaster on April 20, 2010,
Drilling is almost six weeks behind schedule
And $58 million over-budget.
That pressure for time, for speed, for safety
Are always intentions in every industry,
And they can be particularly acute in the oil industry given
The particularly high costs and the particularly high risks
Of some of the operations.
Narrator: Despite this, the later oil spill investigation
Finds no evidence that anyone has been told to risk safety
Decisions by speeding up.
Richard a. Sears: But still there were a lot of decisions
Made, and when you look at some of these decisions,
They tended to bias towards the less time, less costly option.
Now, it doesn't mean that they were
Always necessarily more risky, but it does look like at least
It's in the back of their mind.
It's not an explicit pressure.
Nobody's actually talking about it, but it's there,
And we all know it's there.
Narrator: According to the subsequent presidential
Investigation, almost half the deepwater horizon workers
Believe colleagues were nervous about speaking out
Over safety concerns.
Antonia judhasz: On the final court ruling on bp's liability
For causing the blowout, judge carl barbier in louisiana
Said that profit was all that mattered
In bp's decision-making, and that is what was accurate.
Narrator: The mistakes are stacking up.
Then on the day of the accident, another critical mistake
Is made.
No one realizes that the seal holding back
The flammable oil and gas at the bottom of the well has failed.
Leo lindner: The numbers looked right on paper, I suppose.
They showed almost utter confidence in that one plug,
And that was like the beginning of their problems.
Narrator: April 20, 2010, after 11 weeks on the macondo well
Site, deepwater horizon's crew is finally
Making preparations to move on.
Antonia judhasz: Deepwater horizon was only there
To drill a hole and then plug it and then move on
So that the production rig could come next, remove the cork,
And pull out the oil.
Leo lindner: It was a really tough well,
And I was looking forward to getting it cemented and done.
And I think the whole rig really felt that way.
Narrator: Before moving off, the crew
Must ensure that the explosive oil and gas has been
Contained at the bottom of the well
By a specialized cement seal.
Sambhav sankar: That oil that's deep under the ground
Is under tremendous pressure.
It wants to come to the surface, but you don't want it to come
Out in an uncontrolled way.
Narrator: The problem is that the plan
For the rig leaving macondo has changed
Three times in the last 10 days.
On the morning of the 20th just 14 hours
Before the fatal explosion, it changes for a fourth time.
Leo lindner: I woke up that morning
And really it all changed.
Procedures were always hectic, but this one in particular
Was almost frantic really-- a lot of last minute changes
To the plan.
It had to be a factor in moving forward into the disaster.
Narrator: The changes come so late
Their combined impact hasn't been assessed effectively.
Leo lindner: Usually you have at least a couple of days
Once the plan is finalized, and even small things might
Be changed but not big ones.
And these were all big changes.
It really didn't give time for people to assess the risk.
Narrator: In this hectic schedule on the evening
Of the 20th, the crew begins a critical procedure
To make sure the cement seal that keeps the oil
And gas in the well has worked.
It's called a negative pressure test.
Sambhav sankar: The negative pressure test always involves
Reducing the pressure inside the well
And seeing if the oil flows into the well
Or whether the cement that you put on the outside of the well
Holds the oil in place.
Narrator: The test measures the pressure of the well
From two different pipes.
Both should give the same reading.
Yasmine ali: There should be nothing leaking out,
So the pressure should be zero.
Narrator: But the pressure in one of the pipes keeps rising.
Steven chu: So something's wrong.
So they kind of looked at it, but they were behind schedule.
They're already come on. What's wrong?
Finish the job.
And finally, some engineers there said, oh, there's
This so-called bladder thing.
And other people say, what's that?
Said, no, no, no, I've seen it before, da, da, da.
Ok, uh-uh.
Narrator: The rising pressure is blamed on a phenomenon
Called the bladder effect.
The problem is there's no such thing as the bladder effect.
Leo lindner: I had never heard of a bladder effect.
I didn't understand it when I heard it,
But I thought maybe I was missing something.
Narrator: What the high pressure reading really means
Is that explosive oil and gas are now rising up the drill pipe
Towards the floating rig, and the crew
Doesn't realize it.
Sambhav sankar: That was the key moment,
The moment at which we went from a mistake to a disaster.
Narrator: Around 9:43 pm, a fountain of mud
Pours over the deepwater horizon's deck.
It's followed by a mass of flammable oil and methane gas.
Antonia judhasz: I did interviews with workers
Throughout the rig who would describe feeling
The gas literally move past them like a wraith moving
Through the rig.
Narrator: At 9:49 pm, the methane explodes.
Shrouded in flame, deepwater horizon drifts out of control.
This is when the next mistake comes into play.
A vital emergency device fails to work.
It's supposed to be the last line of defense
Against the catastrophic leak, but a court
Later finds that electrical failures render it useless.
Yasmine ali: The explosion on the rig was a disaster,
But the aftermath and what happened afterwards turn
This event into a catastrophe.
Narrator: Sitting a mile beneath the rig on the sea floor,
The 50-foot-tall blowout preventer also known as the bop
Is the last line of defense against major disasters.
Antonia judhasz: The blowout preventer
Is filled with a series of rams and metal devices
That are supposed to shear the pipe and lock in the well.
The blowout preventer is supposed to keep a blowout
From turning into a disaster.
Narrator: When deepwater horizon begins to drift,
The bop control cables are ripped away.
This should trigger automatic emergency shutdown systems.
Yasmine ali: If electrical power is lost from the rig,
They will kick in and actually close the well.
Because if the power is lost, then that
Suggests that something catastrophic has happened.
Narrator: There are two independent
Emergency control pods.
Either can trigger the bop, but on the day of the disaster,
Both failed to activate.
When the bop is later retrieved, one pod is found
To have been wired incorrectly.
The later court ruling found the other pod's battery was
Too flat to trigger the device.
Maintenance of the blowout preventer
Is one of the recommendations of bp's audit.
Later reports suggest that this never happened.
Antonia judhasz: The rigs are required
Every five years to bring in the blowout preventer
To have it tested.
Deepwater horizon had been out operating for 10 years
And had never had the blowout preventer tested.
Narrator: The blowout preventer is bp's final line of defense.
It isn't enough.
Antonia judhasz: The entire oil spill that happened afterwards
Might have been prevented if they
Had had batteries in the blowout preventer that worked.
Narrator: A chain of mistakes, misjudgments,
And bad management has created a disaster.
Now thousands of gallons of toxic oil
Are pouring into the ocean, and no one knows how to stop it.
Antonia judhasz: All of the major oil companies
In the world were all sitting around a table, and all of them
Essentially shrugged together and said,
Wow, we actually have no idea how to handle this.
Narrator: Following a chain of management, safety,
And engineering mistakes, the deepwater horizon drilling rig
Explodes in the gulf of mexico.
But a mile below the surface, there's an even
More catastrophic problem.
After the initial explosion of methane,
The blaze on board deepwater horizon
Is further fueled by the 700,000 gallons
Of diesel stored on the rig.
In the chaos, it's not immediately obvious
That the emergency cutoff systems have failed,
And the well is leaking.
Narrator: On the morning of the 22,
36 hours after the explosion, deepwater horizon sinks.
Sambhav sankar: If this blowout had happened,
And the crew had gotten it back under control within a day,
I don't think many people would have known
A whole lot about it.
The problem came when the rig blew up and sank.
Narrator: According to the president himself
On the evening following the sinking,
Bp is still assuring the government
That there is no leak.
The coast guard publicly expresses cautious optimism
That any leaks have been contained,
And there will be no environmental impact.
But they are wrong.
Ltd russel l. Honore: Don't believe the first reports.
We learned a long time ago in the army
The first reports are normally wrong.
Narrator: The grim reality is that the well is leaking.
The same morning the rig sinks, the coast guard
Reports a growing oil slick on the surface.
Sambhav sankar: You had what at first was a blowout that
Was happening on the rig continue down
At the bottom of the ocean.
Narrator: The well is spewing out oil uncontrollably fast.
It's known in the industry as a wild well.
The mistake is that for four precious days at the start
Of the disaster people haven't been
Planning for the full scale of the coming catastrophe.
Steven chu: When we first began to realize
The magnitude of this, I have to say, it wasn't instant.
I was watching the estimates coming from bp
About what was leaking out.
They were assuming that it was not so bad.
The industry, the regulators and the country and the world
Were caught flat-footed.
Narrator: Four days after the explosion,
Experts are trying to figure out what scale
Of leak they're really facing.
Steven chu: So initially, bp estimates were a thousand
Barrels a day, and then we later found
That it's more like 50,000 instead of one thousand.
Narrator: Almost the equivalent of the exxon valdez spill
Is being released into the gulf of mexico every four days.
Antonia judhasz: The scale was unimaginable.
Narrator: At the time, bp disputes any higher numbers.
But it was later alleged in court
That deleted texts recovered from an oil engineer's phone
Reveal that it was known during the disaster
That the spill rate was huge.
Antonia judhasz: Bp continually through the course
Of the disaster minimized and tried to hide how much oil was
Being released from the well.
Narrator: November 2012, bp pleads
Guilty to knowingly deceiving the government
Over the size of the oil spill.
Ltd russel l. Honore: We knew bp was lying about the amount
Of oil coming out once they started taking depositions
And people started talking.
Antonia judhasz: And there was many reasons
That bp wanted to do that.
One is it is charged a fine per barrel of oil spilled.
So the smaller the number, the lesser
The fine it's going to face.
Steven chu: Bp wanting to limit the damages.
They wanted to low-ball.
Narrator: Covering up the true scale of the spill
Is a mistake with far larger consequences
Than just a big fine.
Mark davis: It's, sort of, like if you're a fire department.
If no one tells you how big the fire is,
You don't know how many trucks to send.
Narrator: If they had known how bad it was early on,
The initial response might have been
Bigger and faster or maybe not.
Because one of the biggest mistakes of all
Is that literally no one has a clue how to stop it.
Sambhav sankar: Nobody in the oil industry
Had a plan for a deepwater spill of this magnitude
In the gulf of mexico.
Every oil industry person wanted to help bp cap the well,
And nobody could do it.
There was no plan.
Narrator: Despite the size of the leak,
There is initial confidence that the oil industry can handle it.
Antonia judhasz: The industry has said in their applications
To drill in the gulf of mexico that they could
Handle an oil spill three times larger
Than the deepwater horizon.
They knew how to stop the blowout.
They knew how to clean it up and that it certainly wouldn't
Damage the environment or reach the shore
In any significant way.
So when I first saw the photos of the explosion,
I really did believe that whatever was going to happen
Was going to be stopped.
Narrator: The oil industry does have techniques for sealing
Shallow underwater wells, but a mile down in the gulf of mexico
Conditions are very different.
Mark davis: We're working in environments where
When bad things happen,
Your ability to go in and fix it is nil.
It's almost like trying to fix things on the moon.
Narrator: It's cold and pitch black.
The pressure is 150 times greater than at the surface.
No one has really considered how to cap a leaking well
Under these conditions.
Narrator: All they can try are
Their well known shallow water solutions.
Yasmine ali: One of them was a containment dome,
Which is like an upside down funnel.
Steven chu: This is a huge thing that enveloped this blowup
Prevention platform, this 2 and 1/2 story high thing
Spewing oil gas.
And it's a loose funnel.
You have a pipe, and maybe you can slurp up
A large fraction of it.
Narrator: But because containment domes are not
Designed to work at the immense pressure thousands of feet
Below the surface, it fails.
Yasmine ali: The containment dome
Didn't work because of a phenomenon
Called hydrate formation.
So as gas comes out of the well, it crystallizes into ice
Essentially and blocks up the channel of this dome and just
Simply doesn't work.
Steven chu: It should not have been a surprise
That it would've plugged.
Hydrates are something that's known in the oil business.
They plug lots of oil lines.
It was really doomed to fail.
Antonia judhasz: And the oil just kept pouring and pouring
And pouring and pouring.
Narrator: 20 days after the disaster,
The white house is growing increasingly concerned.
The president approaches his energy secretary about it.
Steven chu: President obama came up to me
After a cabinet meeting, and he said, chu, go down there
And help them stop the leak.
So I said, yes sir.
Narrator: The only other way to quickly stop the leak
Is a so-called top kill.
It's a technique that sealed many oil wells in the iraq war,
But these were smaller and on land.
Steven chu: The idea is the oil is coming up.
We can force it down.
This would be great.
And then once you stop the flow, you won.
Narrator: Heavy drilling fluid and a collection
Of other material known as a junk shot are forced
Into the well to block it.
Steven chu: So they would first try some fluids.
They try little bits of foam rubber.
They tried golf balls.
Narrator: A step by step plan is agreed for a top kill.
But as soon as the first attempt fails,
The energy secretary is alarmed to discover
The engineers are starting to make it up as they go.
2:00 am in the morning, I throw a temper tantrum.
It went sort of like, wait a minute.
You guys promised you're going to follow the plan.
And I said, this is not the way to do things.
What's going on?
Now it helps if you're a cabinet member in those situations,
Because you can pick up the phone and call the president.
And so they said all right.
All right, we'll follow the plan.
Narrator: The agreed plan involves
Taking careful measurements of the pressure in the well.
They are alarmingly high.
Steven chu: In the morning,
We're looking at pressure measurements.
They were looking at pressure measurements,
And we don't think this is a good sign.
We think the well could be damaged.
Narrator: The pressure needed to force fluid into the well
Is so high, the well pipe could burst.
If the oil gets out into the surrounding rock,
They will never stop it.
In reality, top kill was never going to work,
Because bp was lowballing the real leak rate.
If one really knew how much oil and gas was coming up,
The idea of throwing stuff down to overwhelm
The stuff coming up would not have been tried.
Because this humongous amount of oil and gas coming up,
Nothing they put down, pieces of foam, drilling mud,
Anything could overwhelm that upward momentum.
Mark davis: Nobody had a plan, because nobody
Wanted to put one together.
It would have cost time.
It would have cost money, and it would
Have admitted that there were risks out there
That you needed to plan for.
Narrator: A catalog of mistakes causes this catastrophe,
But the underplaying of the scale of the leak
And the lack of a plan to cap deep water wells
Makes the disaster bigger and more far reaching.
And there are still two more mistakes
That make a bad situation much, much worse.
Four months after the tragic deepwater horizon explosion
Kills 11 oil workers, a complex drilling
Operation finally seals the leaking well
Permanently with cement.
The leak has spewed around 210 million gallons of oil.
Oil slicks have extended over more than 57,500 square miles
Of the gulf of mexico.
Antonia judhasz: You could see it on the ocean.
You could see it on the shore.
You could see it blanketing animals, all sorts
Of different species, and it just kept coming and kept
Coming and kept coming.
Narrator: Mistake number nine is that bp's cleanup plan
Is hopelessly flawed.
It makes the disastrous spill even worse.
Sambhav sankar: Neither bp nor much
Of the rest of the industry were paying serious attention
To spill or disaster containment plans,
Because they didn't think this could ever happen.
Narrator: A year before the disaster,
Bp submits a detailed 583-page spill response plan
To federal authorities, but the plan
Contains embarrassing mistakes.
Antonia judhasz: That plan was copy
And pasted from the arctic.
So it included things like how do you protect
Walruses from an oil spill.
So there are definitely walruses in the us arctic.
There are no walruses in louisiana.
Mark davis: I think out of sight, out of mind
Was precisely the foundation that these response plans had,
Which is whatever goes wrong will be experienced
By a small group of people and probably some critters that
No one's really looking after.
Ltd russel l. Honore: What the hell?
It's just the gulf of mexico.
Nothing but a bunch of fish out there.
Who the hell cares about the fish?
Narrator: Cleanup efforts deploy floating booms to contain
The oil slicks, but this technology hasn't really
Changed since it was used with very
Mixed results on the exxon valdez disaster
20 years previously.
And just like back then, it only partially contains
The deepwater horizon oil slicks.
Ltd russel l. Honore: They just threw money
At these small contractors to go out and try to put booms out.
It kind of looked like amateur hour.
Narrator: Bp also employs a chemical dispersant
To break the oil down, but no one has ever
Used it on a spill this big.
Antonia judhasz: Bp conducted a massive science
Experiment in the gulf.
They used the chemical dispersant corexit
In a manner and quantities in which
It has never been used before.
Narrator: It doesn't even get rid of the oil.
Antonia judhasz: The dispersant doesn't eliminate the oil.
It just disperses it.
So what it meant was that you sacrificed
The ocean for the shore.
You dispersed the oil out so that it covered
A greater amount of the ocean.
Narrator: Some of the dispersed oil droplets sink
Forming large subsurface clouds of oil invisible from above.
Mark davis: It was not just what happened at the surface,
But it was the entire water column, thousands of feet.
Narrator: And some of the mixed oil and dispersant sludge
Still makes it to shore.
Antonia judhasz: So this chemical goo
Would pour onto beaches, and it looked
Like excrement coming out of the ocean
And pouring onto the sand.
Ltd russel l. Honore: You could smell it.
It was like someone left a can of diesel open,
And I've spent 37 years in the army.
I know how to smell that.
You could smell the petroleum in the air
Constantly even with the breeze blowing.
That's how thick the dispersant was.
Narrator: The combination of oil and dispersant is catastrophic.
Antonia judhasz: It was known that the type of corexit
They used is a chemical toxin.
It's known that crude oil is a chemical toxin.
And what we then learned afterwards
Was that the combination of the two
Was more toxic than either item separately.
Narrator: Despite all this, by 2014,
Bp is claiming that the worst of the oil spill
Has been dealt with, but that leads to the final mistake.
The long-term impact of the spill on the environment,
On health, and on the local economy
Is bigger than anyone had imagined.
And it's still going on today.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: The spill had a devastating impact
On our community.
People were not able to go trawling.
The oyster beds were contaminated.
They stopped being able to sell any type of oysters,
Any type of seafood.
Narrator: The effects of the deepwater horizon oil spill
Have been long lasting and destructive.
In 2014, antonia judhasz got a firsthand look
At the ongoing damage.
Antonia judhasz: When we got down
To the bottom of the ocean, what we were supposed to see
Was a wealth of marine life that simply wasn't present.
What we saw instead was what I would describe
As more of a moonscape.
Anything that could get out of the way of the oil
Got out of the way, and everything
That couldn't was killed.
Narrator: Until 2010, entire communities
Along the gulf coast line had been reliant
On the abundant marine life.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: It was just heartbreaking
To see the sea life come ashore,
You know what I mean, to see the tar balls
Coming ashore, to see our fragile wetlands
Just inundated with oil.
Sambhav sankar: The fishing industry,
Both fin fish and shellfish, were decimated
As a result of the spill.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: It was really more challenging
For the younger generation.
They had children at home.
They had typical family bills to pay.
When your income totally stops, it's devastating.
You saw a lot of houses being repossessed, cars, boats.
Narrator: For many, the only work available
Is cleaning up the oil spill.
Ltd russel l. Honore: The people hardest hit by this disaster
Are primarily poor people, people trying to make
A living to feed their family.
And companies came in to hire day workers
To go out and clean up the oil dispersant
And to clean up the tar balls.
Narrator: The 1.8 million gallons of corexit oil
Dispersant is a known toxin.
Ltd russel l. Honore: We know that the us safety council had
Recommended to the companies that when the workers were
Exposed to the dispersant they should
Have protective uniforms.
Narrator: But some of the workers who carried out
The cleanup claim they were denied
Suitable protection against the chemicals they were handling.
Some cleanup workers have since been
Found to have toxic chemicals in their bodies.
Ltd russel l. Honore: That exposure
Has led to over 3,000 citizens seeking medical assistance.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: We see a lot of people who
Are no longer able to work, no longer able to provide
For their family.
And so people are still feeling the effects of it now.
Sambhav sankar: You can't put that much toxic crude oil out
In the environment and not have impacts
On people's lives and health.
Ltd russel l. Honore: This is destroying people
For an industrial purpose, to get oil.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: My dad never
Was compensated for his trawling, for his fishing,
Never was.
It still brings tears to my eyes after all these years
To see the impact they had on our family
And what they did to my dad.
And I mean, our family wasn't alone in the struggles,
And so the entire coast will never recover or get over it.
Narrator: In the aftermath of the disaster,
The federal regulator, the mms, is replaced by separate bodies
For revenue and enforcement.
In 2014, bp is once again allowed
To bid for oil and gas leases.
Leo lindner: Bp was supposedly punished, because it had to pay
A $20 billion settlement, right, but the government
Came right back and gave them a $15 billion tax credit.
I understand if a guy's selling crack, he gets life.
But if an oil company ruins the gulf,
They get a $15 billion tax credit.
I don't understand that mindset.
Narrator: Because of the world's insatiable demand for oil,
Deepwater offshore drilling continues today.
Some investigators believe little
Has changed since the disaster.
Sambhav sankar: My hope after the disaster was that somebody
Might read our report and say maybe we ought to kick
The tires a little harder.
In fact, 11 years later, I can say, nope.
Things just went back to the way they were.
Narrator: Many still living with the consequences of the spill
Feel the same.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: The sad part
Is it's just a matter of time before it happens again.
Will it be my generation?
Will it be my children's generation or my grandchildren?
We're going to face it again, because nothing's
Been really done to address it.
Antonia judhasz: I interviewed a scientist
Who said a thousand years from now people
Will go down to the bottom of the ocean, and they'll say,
Oh, this is where the deepwater horizon disaster happened,
That the oil that is at the bottom of the ocean
Is going to stay there forever, that the impacts
Will continue forever as well.
Because that oil washes to shore.
That oil interacts with species.
Brenda dardar robuchaux: Our youth are not
Going to be able to experience the beauty
Of what I grew up with.
They're not going to have those opportunities to be able to go
Out on a fishing boat and experience what I grew
Up experiencing with my dad.
Just they're not going to have the beautiful communities
Because of the impact of the oil spill.
Antonia judhasz: We will feel the repercussions
Of this disaster for as long as we're still able to be here.
[music playing]