Atlantis papers show familiar BP pattern of neglect

By Loren Steffy
12 April 2012 We now know why BP wanted to keep information about its massive Atlantis platform in the Gulf of Mexico a secret. Thousands of pages of internal documents and emails, recently released in a long-running lawsuit, reveal ongoing safety issues, deficient design documents and a pattern of problems that are disturbingly similar to some of the company’s past operating failures.
The documents came to light in a lawsuit filed in 2009 by Kenneth Abbott, a former BP contractor and industry veteran. Abbott claims BP didn’t comply with almost 90 percent of the necessary engineering inspections for Atlantis. The company fought to keep millions of pages of evidence sealed, claiming they contained trade secrets. The documents were released after Abbott protested and attorneys for the Hearst Corp., the Chronicle’s parent company, and other media organizations filed briefs in support of unsealing them. […] Last year, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management found “significant problems” with BP’s labeling of engineering drawings related to the platform, a theme of Abbott’s allegations, but found the lack of proper certifications on documents didn’t pose a safety risk. The finding, almost a year after the Deepwater Horizon disaster, raises concerns not just about BP’s operations, but about the regulator as well. What is the point of requiring design documents be certified by licensed engineers if the requirement isn’t enforced? Depositions and emails from BP employees released in the Abbott case show that at times BP personnel couldn’t locate critical design drawings when troubleshooting controls malfunctions on the platform. BP managers also testified that key designs weren’t reviewed or approved by licensed engineers, even though in some cases BP told regulators they were. […] Documents in the Abbott case include an internal audit from 2009 that found calculations weren’t done on 150 of Atlantis’ 500 pressure-relief valves to determine if they were the right size. In one case, a critical pressure-control valve designed for a 3-inch line was put on a 16-inch pipeline. […] It’s no wonder BP wanted to keep them from the public eye. It wasn’t trying to protect trade secrets, it was trying to cover up an all-too-familiar pattern.

Atlantis papers show familiar BP pattern