Lakeview – the largest oil gusher in history
If you ask the average person about what kind of oil gush and spill there was in the history of oil production, he will hardly be able to name it. Most people have heard something about the accident on the Deepwater Horizon platform – but they too will be mistaken. This was the largest blowout at an offshore well. And the largest oil spill was the Lakeview oil gusher, and almost twice as much oil was spilled there as on the notorious Deepwater Horizon platform – about 1.1-1.3 million tons, and “only” spilled into the Gulf of Mexico 670 thousand tons of oil.
The Midway-Sunset field is one of the largest in America. It is located in Kern County in sunny California.
It was discovered in 1894, the total accumulated production is 4 billion barrels. By this indicator, it is second only to Prudhoe Bay and the East Texas field.
It is not that large in size, about 80 square kilometers. But in this area there are 6 different oil-bearing geological formations, the most powerful of which is the Gusher Pool. This name arose for a reason; it was on this site that there were two powerful fountains, the first of which has the sad palm.
This structure was found in 1909; while drilling an exploration well, a powerful fountain hit, which gave it its name. The Lakeview Oil Company was organized by Julius Freed, R.D. Wade, F.E. Dunlap and Charles F. Off. The drilling site was chosen by Julius Freed himself, who was one of the most famous wildcatters – as the pioneer oil explorers were called in the USA.
Drilling began on January 1, 1909. According to legend, Fried chose this site on the assumption that stands of red grass (Bouteloua trifida) indicated good oil fields.
First, gas came out of the well, which was practically not used at that time; everyone was interested in oil. But oil never appeared. When the well reached a depth of 500 meters, the company ran out of money. Then she entered into a contract with the Union Oil Company. Drilling had been going on for almost 14 months and Union was tired of wasting money. They fired the old driller and brought in their own, Charlie Woods. He was a good driller, but he was categorically unlucky; almost all the wells he drilled turned out to be “dry” (did not produce oil). Therefore, the nickname “Dry Hole” stuck to it.
But this time he was either lucky or completely unlucky. On March 15, 1910, when the well reached a depth of 740 meters, a powerful fountain burst out of it with a roar. It was so powerful that it tore the crown block off the drilling rig. This delighted the drilling crew, especially Charlie Woods. But by the end of the first day, delight gave way to anxiety. Already on the first day, the fountain threw out 125 thousand barrels of oil and did not think of stopping. But they simply could not stop it, the drilling rigs were primitive and were not equipped with blowout prevention equipment, and the technology for suppressing the fountains had not yet been developed. All that remained was to wait for him to calm down.
But he didn’t even think about stopping. Even after a month, the influx of oil reached 90 thousand barrels, a whole fortune was poured onto the ground.
The streams of oil that poured out of the well created a river of crude oil that threatened to flow downhill to Lake Buena Vista, located ten kilometers from the drilling site, the water of which was used for irrigation. To prevent this, oil workers surrounded the well with berms made of sandbags and dug reservoirs where the oil accumulated.
At first they tried to cover the fountain with a box of logs, but nothing came of it; the fountain literally scattered the logs
The company quickly built an oil pipeline that pumped oil from the pits to eight reservoirs that were located about 3 kilometers away. Oil was transported from the reservoirs via pipeline to Port Avila on the California coast.
Although fountains were a common sight in the San Joaquin Valley, no one had seen such a natural disaster before. Enterprising Americans rose to the occasion here too. All newspapers wrote about the fountain, and a daily tourist train from Los Angeles was launched to the nearest city with rail connections. Every day thousands of onlookers came to look at the fountain. A dubious pleasure, given the considerable likelihood of oil fire. And on windy days, clothes were soaked through with oil.
Soon the rig collapsed. The fight against the elements continued. Workers built a dam of sandbags and earth around the well, 4 meters high and 40 meters in diameter. The pool inside the dam is finally deep enough to turn the fountain into a gurgling lake
The area around the well turned into an environmental disaster zone. The fight against the fountain lasted 18 months. On September 10, 1911, the well shaft collapsed and it died out.
Over 544 days, the fountain released a colossal amount of oil – over a million tons (9.4 million barrels). About half were saved and put on the market, while the other half evaporated and went into the ground. But this volume was enough to bring down the price of oil on the American market by 50%!!!
The area around the well is still visible even from space
The oil that soaked into the sand froze and formed structures similar to lava flows.
A small monument was erected at the site of the disaster in memory of the tragedy and it belongs to the historical landmarks of California under number 495
Author: Sigurd Sigurdov
