Oil well fire
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Oil well fires are oil gushers that have caught on fire, and burn uncontrollably.
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[edit] Extinguishing the fires
Oil well fires are more difficult to extinguish than regular fires due to the enormous fuel supply for the fire. Firefighters who are specially trained to deal with oil fires are usually hired to extinguish them. There are several techniques used to put out oil well fires, which vary by resources available and the characteristics of the fire itself.
In essence the trade was started by Myron M. Kinley, who dominated the field in the early years. His lieutenant, Red Adair, went on to become the most famous of oil well firefighters.
Techniques include:[1]
- Dousing with copious amounts of water
- Raising the plume- Inserting one metal casing 30 to 40 feet high over the well head (thus raising the flame above the ground). Liquid nitrogen or water is then forced in at the bottom to reduce the oxygen supply and put out the fire.
- Drill relief wells to redirect the oil and make the fire smaller (and easier to extinguish with water).
- Using a jet engine to direct high pressure water and air over the well.
- Using dynamite to 'blow out' the fire by blasting fuel and oxygen from the flame and consuming oxygen in the combustion. This was one of the earliest effective methods and is still widely used. The first use was by Myron Kinley's father in California in 1913 [2]
- Dry Chemical (mainly Purple K) can be used on small well fires such as those in refineries.
Special vehicles called "Athey wagons" as well as the typical bulldozer protected by corrugated steel sheeting are normally used in the process.[3]
[edit] Effects
Oil well fires can cause the loss of millions of barrels of crude oil per day.[4] Combined with the ecological problems caused by the large amounts of smoke and unburnt petroleum falling back to earth, oil well fires such as those seen in Kuwait can cause enormous economic losses.
Smoke from burnt crude oil contains many chemicals, including sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, soot, benzopyrene, Poly aromatic hydrocarbons, and dioxins. [5] Exposure to oil well fires is commonly cited as a cause of the Gulf War Syndrome, however, studies have indicated that the firefighters who capped the wells did not report any of the symptoms suffered by the soldiers. [6]
[edit] Famous fires
- Kuwaiti oil fires
- Piper Alpha, an oil rig that caught fire
[edit] References
- ^ John Wright Company Technical Library resource on blowout control
- ^ "The Fire Beater," Time
- ^ Putting Out an Oil Well Fire
- ^ Linda Snider, Oil Well Fires & Spills
- ^ Desk Study on the Environment in Iraq, United Nations Environment Program
- ^ Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses: Final Report, December 1996
[edit] See also
- Oil well
- Red Adair, a famous oil well firefighter
- Safety Boss, an oil-well-fire-fighting company
