BP spill: new fears after seepage find
Updated on 19 July 2010
After the apparently successful installation of a cap on the leaking BP oil well last week, engineers detect seepage on the ocean floor - which could mean there are still leaks.
On Sunday BP officials expressed the hope that a cap which has stopped oil from gushing into the water since last Thursday could remain in place until a relief well permanently seals the leak next month.
BP choked off the flow 1.6km below the water's surface on 15 July. It was the first time oil had not flowed from the well since an explosion on 20 April on an offshore rig which killed 11 workers.
But the US government released a letter to BP Chief Managing Director Bob Dudley on Sunday evening, which referred to an unspecified seepage near the well, along with "undetermined anomalies at the well head".
The letter, from retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, who is in charge of the White House response to the spill, ordered BP to provide a plan for reopening the well by 1am today.
"I direct you to provide me a written procedure for opening the choke valve as quickly as possible without damaging the well should hydrocarbon seepage near the well head be confirmed," the letter said.
Allen's letter also said: "When seeps are detected, you are directed to marshal resources, quickly investigate, and report findings to the government in no more than four hours."
More from Channel 4 News on the BP oil spill
- BP begins crucial cap test in Gulf of Mexico
- US senators target BP over Lockerbie link
- Rivals, white knights and Libya: who wants BP?
- Who Knows Who: Tony Hayward
- The pension fund victims of the BP oil spill
- BP oil spill: timeline of events
Megrahi on the agenda
The weekend's developments are sure to feature in talks in Washington on Tuesday, when Prime Minister David Cameron meets US President Barack Obama in Washington.
President Obama expects BP to pay clean-up and compensation costs in the wake of the disaster. If the British prime minister accepts this, then the US administration may agree not to push BP into bankruptcy.
BP directors are thought to have held talks with major shareholders over a restructuring of the company, according to a report in the Sunday Times. Options under consideration include a scaling-back of the company's US operations and doing more engineering in-house rather than outsourcing it.
BP's alleged role in the release of Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset al-Megrahi will also be on the talks agenda. At the weekend the British government said there was no evidence of any connection between BP and Megrahi's release last year.
The US senate foreign relations committee has scheduled a hearing for 29 July on possible ties between the British oil giant and the release of Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer who was the only person convicted of the bombing of PanAm flight 103.
BP has said it lobbied the British government about slow progress in resolving a different prisoner transfer agreement with Libya in 2007 but was not involved in Megrahi's release.
