'He was in pretty bad shape.' Harrell was the rig's offshore installation manager (OIM).

'He was coughing and vomiting,' said Williams. Jimmy,' Mike Williams recalled seeing Jimmy Harrell when he made it to the bridge after the explosions (Williams did not rescue Harrell outside his stateroom as Mark Wahlberg's character does in the movie). Was crew captain Jimmy Harrell, portrayed by Kurt Russell, seriously injured in the disaster? Was Mike Williams badly injured during the Deepwater Horizon explosion?Īctor Mark Wahlberg (left) and his character's real-life counterpart, Mike Williams (right), on the set of the Deepwater Horizon movie. Oil company BP later tried to blame offshore drilling contractor Transocean for failing to adequately maintain the BOP and control the well ( Chemical Safety Board). As a result, the pipe was only partially cut and a seal could not be made. However, the BOP failed to seal the well, most likely because the drill pipe inside it had buckled due to 'effective compression' and was off-center when the blind shear ram attempted to cut the pipe. Jimmy (Kurt Russell) tries to do in the movie. In the moments after the gas on the rig ignited, the crew tried to activate the BOP before abandoning ship, as Mr. The vessel above can then safely disconnect from the well. If those rams and the annular preventers fail to work, the last resort is the blind shear ram, which is supposed to cleanly slice the drill pipe so that it can be sealed off. The BOP is a 4-story, 350-ton stack of hydraulic valves that control powerful rams that can slam tightly shut and seal off the well completely if there's a problem. To help do this, a blowout preventer (BOP) sits on top of the well head.

The pressure must be controlled at all times. An enormous amount of pressure exists in the well, ready to unleash oil and gas. Drilling an oil well is a lot like puncturing a balloon. Researching the Deepwater Horizon true story confirmed the rig suffered what in the industry is termed a 'blowout,' a sudden surge of oil and gas that bursts out of the well. What caused the Deepwater Horizon oil rig to explode? Propane tanks and other flammables became potential bombs on the decks. This Coast Guard image shows flames engulfing the real Deepwater Horizon oil rig. Had Mike Williams really been on a call with his wife just before the disaster? It was essentially a large boat that was floating on the water, unlike some oil rigs that are supported by stilts that reach the ocean floor. Its purpose was to dig holes looking for it and then move on. As the film emphasizes, the Deepwater Horizon didn't pump oil. The find had the potential of yielding in excess of 200 million gallons of oil per year. The crew had been in the final stages of shutting down the exploratory Macondo Well located more than 18,000 feet below the surface. It was the largest oil rig in the world at the time and had been digging the deepest well in history, starting on the seabed at a depth of 5,000 feet beneath the Gulf of Mexico. The Deepwater Horizon true story reveals that the rig was located 52 miles off the coast of Venice, Louisiana. How far off the coast was the rig and how deep was it drilling? If one single family member objects to this project on the merits - not on the emotional part of it but the merits - then we’ve failed. … We need to tell the story the way it happened. I didn’t go looking for this, but I did accept the challenge of bringing this to the screen and getting it right to speak for my 11 brothers who can’t speak.

Deepwater horizon movie