Heli Pilot spots major leak from subsea pipeline

[roundwego]

I heard a story recently of a major gas leak from a pipeline off the Aberdeenshire coast being spotted by an overflying helicopter crew. Is this true? I would have thought with the terrible weather recently, it would be impossible to see a leak unless it was particularly massive. If it is true, it can't be doing the UK gas supply any good. Has anything hit the press yet? I understand the Aberdeen Coastguard were involved.

[Wizzard]

Mmm... Where did you hear this?

[roundwego]

An acquaintance who has coastguard contacts was asking me if this was possible. I thought unlikely - not that a pipeline couldn't develop a leak but that the helicopter crew would see it.


If I had heard it my from my local taxi driver I would have known it was true. He is a very good source.

[coalface]

It is true (I am told by a source close to the leak)

[Max Contingency]

I once saw what I later assumed to be a release of natural gas from the sea bed close to known gas fields in the North Sea. It took me several seconds to work out what I was watching. A large flat bubble of gas that I estimate to have been about the size of a van erupted from the sea just where I happened to be looking (about 500' ASL at the time). Within 5 seconds there was no evidence left on the surface that it had ever happened. Before I could talk the other pilots eyes on to it, it was gone!

Submarine?
Whale fart?
Bermuda triangle?


Any one else seen anything unusual out there?
(and I don't mean unusual as in a Captain doing his own walk round in the rain :eek: )

[Revolutionary]

I used to fly for a gas pipeline company in the GOM. We were always on the lookout for leaks and I've seen a few, although always in reasonably good weather with pretty calm seas. It looks like a cross between a bathtub drain and someone blowing bubbles from beneath the water. It always got the crew in a frenzy: the fix is expensive, especially when you factor in the heavy fines.

[212man]

I was flying along a few years ago (Jan 98?), on a Sunday afternoon, over the bight of Biafra (south of Eket, Nigeria) when the co-pilot and I spotted a disturbance on the water surface. We were about 400 ft ASL in vis of less than a mile (it was thick Harmattan haze) and in the brief time we saw it surmised it was an oil leak and reported it immediately on the radio. The message was passed on. We never saw it again that day as the vis was so poor and we didn't happen to be in that particular piece of airspace again.

24 hours later, by now the leaking 18 inch oil pipeline had aquired bouancy, as the compressed gas in the oil had come out of solution, and it had risen to break the surface of the sea, spurting oil about 50 ft into the air at great pressure. Although stil poor vis, another aircraft crew spots it and reports it.

Some time later, I can't recall how long, but next day I think, the pipeline is shutdown and the process of investigating, repair and clean up begins. The 'conservative' estimate of oil lost was 40,000 barrels. The oil slick drifted from the South East corner of the coast of Nigeria as far as offshore Lagos (several hundred miles) but fortunately did not reach the shore in any great quantity.

Kept us busy though; we had 7 212s and a 355 doing a variety of tasks from underslung detergent spraying (it was too poor vis for the C-130 from UK to fly in!), to slick spotting and community liaison personnel 'moving' to the various communities affected. 'Affected' is open to interpretation, and some of the demands had to be seen to be belived.

We were briefly interrupted when the youths in the town we lived decided to go 'banzai' one day, and we had to hide in the bar of our compound (seemed the best option!) while we waited to see whether they would come in or not and whether we would have to try and 'run away'. Fortunately not, but the bar profits went up!

Another day in paradise!:ok: