Must read: Lax Oversight Seen in Failure of Oil Rig's Last Line of Defense. Watch video and interactive graphic page, too. Best overview of how the BOP works, and doesn't work, and the management interference that caused the accident. Deepwater Horizon BP Oil Spill Reference Material - from Whitis is the best source for everything.. The quantitative data diary has also been moved there. Jeff Masters of Weather Underground posted his take on the effects of a hurricane passing through the Gulf and making landfall.

Please DO NOT Rec this diary, Rec the Mothership here.

BP put up a video explaining the LMRP procedure and the future plans.

Go to the Deepwater Horizon Data Summary for a wealth of actual data from the Department of Energy.

The BOP and pressure drawings are viewable here. The CAD drawings come highly recommended by the techies among us. h/t Claudius Bombarnac.

A brief reference guide to nicknames you may see in the ROV diaries: Gertrude, aka Gerty : the oil volcano

: the oil volcano Lizzy : the diamond saw cutter

: the diamond saw cutter Clampy : the cute ROV

: the cute ROV Crunchy : 30 ft shear. bit the pipe, now a movie star

: 30 ft shear. bit the pipe, now a movie star Wanda : the dispersant sprayer

: the dispersant sprayer laundry basket : yellow thing that brings things up and down

: yellow thing that brings things up and down Thingy : those things, you know, those things

: those things, you know, those things Shiny Thing : those really neat things

: those really neat things Ms. Blanche Flo, aka Blanche, aka Flo: the manifold thingy

Thanks to dov12348 for publishing a diary on Oil Terminology.

Here is a tutorial on the sources of pressure on the well

H/t to Pluto for finding this:

The official casing configuration under the wellhead.







Again, to keep bandwidth down please do not post images or videos.

Links, courtesy of several Kossacks

Previous liveblog ROV diaries:

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV # 187 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Darryl House

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV # 186 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - khowell

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV # 185 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Gulf Watchers Overnight/peraspera

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV # 184 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Yasuragi

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #183 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - ekyprogressive

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #182 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Gulf Watchers Overnight/peraspera

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #181 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Wee Mama

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #180 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - gchaucer2

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #179 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Yasuragi

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #178 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Khowell/alkalinesky

Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #177 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Gulf Watchers Overnight / Peraspera

Previous motherships and ROV's from this extensive live blog effort may be found here.

We Are Here We are here. We are watching. Years from now, if anyone asks, we will tell them: We were there. Maybe it will not matter. Maybe nothing matters. But if we throw up our hands now, maybe someday, years from now, we will ask ourselves, why did we not at least keep watch, why did we not? Maybe someday, some of us will talk with someone younger, and tell of the time we watched. Maybe that someone younger will try harder next time, will do more next time, remembering the time we watched. -- bigjacbigjacbigjac

We're all stunned and horrified by this disaster. Huddling with good people to calculate the damage and monitor progress, have a laugh when we can, share the sorrow we feel, and learn a lot in the process... That's what I'm really here for.

This is how I best cope. And if it turns out to be a useful thing to others, then that's great.

Kimberley

This is where you want to be for discussion, worrying, tearing up, and caring for each other. It's also where you're welcome to be angry and scream and curse and cry and rant at the criminal negligence and greed that have brought us all together. Most importantly, though, it's where we can learn from those kossaks among us (I'll not name names for abject fear of leaving one of you out, but you know who you are.) who bring the light of knowledge - sometimes with heat, sometimes without it - and teach us about what's happening beneath our Gulf of Mexico. On a personal note, I'll ask you to please be kind to each other in our little boats. There's enough hurt going on outside without bringing it here. - khowell

Bandwidth Warning: NO IMAGES and NO VIDEOS. Readers who are on DIALUP will thank you!