Tag Archives: Gulf of Mexico

Gulf of Mexico Evacuations

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Oil firms start U.S. Gulf evacuations due to weather

ReutersBy Kristen Hays and Erwin Seba | Reuters – Wed, Aug 31, 2011

  • HOUSTON (Reuters) – BP Plc on Wednesday became the first major oil producer to say it was evacuating some workers from Gulf of Mexico oil and gas platforms because of a tropical disturbance that could become a named storm this week.

Later on Wednesday, Anadarko Petroleum Corp joined BP saying it has evacuated non-essential workers from three platforms in the Gulf.

Royal Dutch Shell also was preparing to evacuate some workers and expected to decide whether to move forward with that during the day, spokeswoman Kelly op de Weegh said.

Shell was monitoring the system over the northwestern Caribbean Sea and the eastern Gulf. The National Hurricane Center said the weather formation had a 30 percent chance of becoming a cyclone in the next two days.

Chevron Corp, Exxon Mobil Corp, ConocoPhillips and Apache Corp also said they were monitoring the system.

BP, the biggest oil producer in the Gulf with eight company-operated oil and gas platforms, said it was evacuating from five platforms more than 500 “nonessential” workers, or those not directly involved in production, such as cooks.

The platforms involved are Thunder Horse, the world’s largest with capacity to produce up to 250,000 barrels of oil per day, and Na Kika, Mad Dog, Holstein and Atlantis.

“Essential personnel remain on board to continue safe operations and prepare the platforms for potential shut-in and full evacuation in the event it becomes necessary,” the company said in a statement.

Anadarko said the workers were taken from the Gunnison, Nansen and Boomvang platforms.

“We will continue to monitor the path of the weather and are prepared to evacuate all personnel and shut in production if necessary,” Anadarko said in a statement.

Shell is the second-largest producer in the Gulf, operating six oil and gas platforms.

Mexico’s state oil monopoly Pemex said it was monitoring the weather but not yet taking any emergency or precautionary steps.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center gives the disturbance, which would be called Lee if it becomes a tropical storm, a 60 percent chance of becoming a tropical cyclone in the next 48 hours, but said it could develop further when it reaches the western Gulf.

for more, go to:   http://news.yahoo.com/oil-firms-start-u-gulf-evacuations-due-weather-005732473.html

Hurricane Updates

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Katia organizing; threat of a Gulf of Mexico storm
Posted by: JeffMasters, 4:38 PM GMT on August 31, 2011
Tropical Storm Katia 
Tropical Storm Katia continues its long trek across the Atlantic Ocean today, and is expected to arrive at a position several hundred miles north of the Northern Lesser Antilles Islands by Monday. At this time, it appears unlikely that the islands will receive tropical storm-force winds from Katia. Satellite images show that Katia is a well-organized storm with plenty of heavy thunderstorms. The storm has good upper-level outflow channels to the north and south, is under light wind shear, and is traversing warm waters, so it should be able to overcome any dry air problems by Thursday and intensify into a hurricane. It is looking less likely that Katia will affect land. Dr. Bob Hart’s Historical Tropical Cyclone Probability web page suggests shows that tropical storms in Katia’s current position have an 11% chance of hitting North Carolina, a 12% chance of hitting Canada, a 5% chance of hitting Florida, and a 62% chance of never hitting land. It will be two more days before our computer models will be able to assess the threat to land, though, as Katia is currently still very far out at sea.


Figure 2. The morning run of the GFS Ensemble prediction. The ensemble prediction was done by taking a lower-resolution version of the GFS model and changing the initial distributions of temperature, pressure, and humidity randomly by a few percent to generate an ensemble of 20 different computer projections of where Katia might go. The operational (highest-resolution) version of the GFS model (white line) is usually more accurate, but the ensemble runs give one an idea of the uncertainty in the forecast. Very few of the ensemble members are currently showing a threat to the U.S. Canada is more at risk than the U.S., according to this model.

Gulf of Mexico disturbance a threat to develop
Surface winds over the Gulf of Mexico are rising today in advance of the approach of a tropical wave currently over the Western Caribbean, western tip of Cuba, and Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. This wave is headed west-northwest at 10 – 15 mph, and is under a high 20 – 30 knots of wind shear. The wave is slowly beginning to build an increased amount of heavy thunderstorms, and this process will accelerate on Thursday when the wave enters the Gulf of Mexico. By Friday, when the wave will be near the Louisiana or Texas coast, wind shear is expected to drop to low to moderate levels, and the wave may be able to organize into a tropical depression. This process will likely take several days, and formation of a tropical depression is more likely Saturday or Sunday. NHC is giving the wave just a 10% chance of developing into a tropical depression by Friday morning. Regardless, this system will spread heavy rains to portions of the Gulf Coast by Friday, with the Upper Texas coast and the coast of Louisiana the most likely recipients of heavy rain. Strong onshore winds raising tides to 1 – 2 feet above normal are likely over Louisiana beginning on Friday, and coastal flood statements have been issued for the region. Three of our four top models for predicting tropical cyclone development forecast that a tropical depression will form this weekend or early next week, and I think it is at least 50% likely we will have Tropical Depression 13 on our hands by Monday. However, steering currents will be weak in the Gulf, and it is difficult to predict where the storm might go.The GFS model has a possible tropical depression forming by Sunday off the coast of Mississippi, then moving east-northeast over the Florida Panhandle on Monday. The ECMWF model forms the storm on Monday off the coast of Texas, and leaves the storm stalled out there through Wednesday. The UKMET model forms the storm Saturday off the coast of Louisiana, and leaves it stalled out there through Monday. If the storm did remain in the Gulf of Mexico for three days as some of the recent model runs have been predicting, it would be a threat to intensify into a hurricane.

Tropical System Approaching

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Tropical system heading westward toward the Leeward Islands this next week

Published on August 13, 2011 6:40 am PT
– By Kevin Martin – Senior Meteorologist
– Article Editor and Approved – Warren Miller


Click for tracking map for article

(TheWeatherSpace.com) — A wide tropical wave, or Invest 93, is moving across the Central Atlantic will head westward toward the Leeward Islands by the middle of next week.

As of now the system looks favorable for additional development over the next several days and it should be a slow developing system at that.

The system is riding pretty far South which would naturally put it South of Puerto Rico but since it is so far away my forecast “cone of uncertainty” will remain wide, covering Puerto Rico.

The ridge will migrate westward with the system which is leading me to believe this system will actually keep moving due west toward the Leeward/Windward Islands.

Should this forecast be correct we may have a threat into the Gulf Of Mexico within a week and all eyes should remain on this system.

The system is not a threat at the time to the United States being how far away it is and we have plenty of time to forecast the track. Now it is not to say that down the line it will not be a dangerous storm because it very well could be.

to read more, go to:    http://www.theweatherspace.com/news/TWS-08_13_2011_leeward.html