Page 10: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (Sep/Oct 2019)

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LEADING OFF P&A

WHAT BECAME OF THE RIGS?

The Bay Driller and the Bay Flame were ordered by Houlder Drilling

Inc. in the early 1980s from UIE

Shipyard on Clydebank, Scotland.

At some point after it ? nished drilling in Morecambe Bay, the

Bay Flame was converted to an accommodation module for use on the Lennox gas ? eld, part of the

Douglas complex in the Irish Sea.

The Bay Driller became the GSF

Adriatic XI jackup rig. Following an upgrade in 2004, it continued to work before being sold to Buccaneer

Energy subsidiary Kenai Offshore

Ventures in 2011, for use in the

Cook Inlet, Alaska. It was renamed

Endeavour Spirit of Independence and transported to Saldanha Bay in South Africa for a refurbishment but, following the bankruptcy of

Buccaneer, it’s languished there since, cold stacked.

The slant well drilling packages were removed from each prior to their conversions. Spirit Energy believes they were then scrapped.

Tell us if you know where they are!

Source: MW Visuals Ltd.

quired if vertical drilling rigs were to be Although these types of well are un- Faced with this challenge, Spirit En- used,” says SPE paper SPE-16151-MS, common, Spirit Energy has a large num- ergy went to the market for solutions. presented at the SPE/IADC Drilling ber of them in Morecambe Bay. There The preferred vendor Herrenknecht, a

Conference, in New Orleans, in 1987. are 50 wells in total in the ? eld, split German tunnel boring technology ? rm

While it worked for Morecambe Bay, across six of its eight platforms, with leveraged their existing onshore slant it’s not a commonly used technique; no four subsea wells. Of the platform wells, well drilling packages. “Instead of re- other offshore ? eld in the UK used it 28 are slant wells with ? ve on DP3 and designing offshore drilling technology, and it’s little known of elsewhere (your four on DP4 facilities, which are the ? rst you can tilt the hydraulic mast between author found a reference to use of a “Tilt platforms in the ? eld to reach the end of vertical and slant wells,” says Donald rig” offshore Peru in the 1960s (SPE- their productive lives (while others are Martin, Project Manager at Spirit Ener- 2312-MS), except perhaps west Africa. being refurbished). gy. The technology required signi? cant 10 OFFSHORE ENGINEER OEDIGITAL.COM