Sea of Greed

Looking through the forward glass, Kurt could see the columns of fire clearly now. Joe navigated around them but also had to avoid sections of the half-submerged rig, tangles of wreckage and floating debris.

“This isn’t oil or natural gas,” he mused.

“I don’t think so either,” Joe said. “But, then, what is it?”

“No idea,” Kurt said. “Something tells me we’d better find out.”

8

NUMA VESSEL RALEIGH, ON STATION OUTSIDE THE FIRE ZONE

KURT HAD SHED the firefighting gear, showered and thrown on some jeans and a NUMA T-shirt. Never had normal clothes felt more comfortable.

He made his way to the sick bay, where the ship’s doctor checked his hands and found them to be burned — something Kurt could have told him without all the poking and prodding.

“Nothing too bad,” the doctor said. “Just first-degree. Don’t high-five anyone for a few days and you’ll be fine.”

After applying some Silvadene cream, the doc released him and Kurt met up with Joe, Captain Brooks and Rick Cox at the command and control center for the Raleigh’s dive teams — a compartment the crew referred to as OSLO.

The acronym stood for off ship and land operations. The crew pronounced it like the name of the Norwegian capital and referred to it that way, too. Meet you in OSLO for the briefing. Where have you been all day, stuck in OSLO?

From here, a project leader could monitor the status of crew members and submersibles conducting dives or landside operations. Screens around the room could display images beamed in from helmet-mounted cameras, ROVs and anything else NUMA used.

Sonar images, including those relayed from other ships, buoys and sleds, could be combined into one coherent picture and presented on the centerpiece of the room, a 3-D virtual display that its designers called a holographic presentation chamber.

The crew of the Raleigh called it the fish tank because it was the size of a billiard table and, when turned off, appeared to be nothing more than a huge block of frosted glass.

Once turned on and supplied with sonar data, it created a miniature, three-dimensional view of whatever area was under observation, including accurate positions and scales of any divers, submersibles, reefs, wrecks, obstructions and surface ships in the sonar area. All in incredible detail.

Looking into the tank from above provided a top-down view. Moving around to any of the sides gave the observer a side-on view and allowed the project manager to gain a big-picture understanding of any operation that was being conducted.

He walked in to find Joe, Brooks and Cox studying several wall-mounted screens at the far end of the compartment. The first screen was displaying the ongoing fire as viewed from the masthead cameras. Another showed them a satellite view of the Gulf, with the pall of smoke that was drifting eastward.

A third screen displayed a map of the Gulf, showing the positions of every active drilling rig, capped wellhead and pipeline in the area. The arrangement looked like a mess of tangled string.

A fourth screen showed the grim faces of two men in Washington. Rudi Gunn, who was NUMA’s Assistant Director and second-in-command, and Lance Alcott, the head of FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Alcott was talking as Kurt walked in. “…and the Coast Guard is sending five ships to help fight the blaze, but until they arrive, the President has put NUMA in charge. A decision that makes no sense to me, but there you have it.”

Alcott shot Rudi a sour look. Rudi ignored him completely and took over the conversation. “First order of business is to assess the damage.”

Captain Brooks had already done that. “We’ve circled the fire zone, studying the surviving rigs and scanning the waters below with sonar. We have a full picture of the destruction. The pipeline network is damaged and venting gas. The Alpha Star is a total loss — she won’t be on the surface much longer. The other two rigs are in better shape, the crews are safe, but the platforms are in danger. They remain surrounded by fire, though not directly ablaze at the moment.”

Rudi looked toward Cox. “Your company was hoping we could save the other platforms.”

“They cost almost a billion dollars each,” Cox replied.

Rudi nodded. “So I’ve heard. We’re sending a pair of oceangoing tugs to drag them out of danger. But looking at the video, I don’t see any hope of getting a line on either one unless the fires dampen down.”

“That’s unlikely,” Cox said.

Alcott had a suggestion. “We’re sending tankers to latch onto the outer wellheads. They’ll draw some oil and gas off to decrease what’s venting. That might reduce the flames.”

“Might as well turn the tankers around,” Kurt said. “They’ll only get in the way.”

The head of FEMA bristled at that suggestion. “We found them useful in the Deepwater Horizon incident. Kept two million barrels of oil from hitting the Gulf waters.”