Page 29 - Flange News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

They actually did simulations. it actually created a physical model so they could practice bolting them. whether or not they actually practiced on that particular flange itself we will figure that out and get back to you. there was extensive testing done and actually created a way to actually model this and actually test putting the package together before they took it out of the water. >> admiral eileen plummen with public radio. how confident are you in the relief well's structure and engineering and that that won't blow up, as well? how confident are you in those relief wells? >> well, the ...

>> you know, a subsurface well failure, the well was designed to take that load when it was originally drilled, and if it does fail, it could fail very deep. the fluids would never reach the surface in that case. >> so all in all, this is just pure positive news coming out of the gulf this morning. >> i really think so. the fact that they've got a mechanically engaged seal that's basically a flange instead of a slip-on friction seal, if you will, that's a great improvement. >> darryl, a lot of people have been asking the question. perhaps we just don't know how long things take from an enginee...

They unbolted it. that piece is gone. they bolted a new piece on here with a much better-looking flange. that flange is now straight enough and hard enough to get a new basically blowout preventer on top of this stack, a blowout preventer. they can spin it around. there are three different places that this thing will shoot, bang, bang, bang, it will shoot these layers, this knives into this oil and it will stop it from coming out altogether. that's what this is going to do, compared to that old thing that was just meant there to suck out the oil that was coming out. this is completely differen...

Gushing out the way it is. since that cap was removed ux, more oil has been gushing out of the well, but they had to get the old cap out of there to move this new one in there. it's 30 feet tall, weighs 80 tons. this has a connector and what's called a flange transition spool that's already connected to the leaking well. that's what's already down there. we're going to show you an animation where you're going to see how they're putting it on. this is the transition spool they've already put in place. that's an animation of that going in place. then the r.o.v.'s kind of sealing it in. then come...

This is a larger vessel than some of the other ones we've seen, and bp has been working all week to get it hooked up. that could be on line today. the second big development we're seeing is the first part of the brand new permanent cap is being lowered sub-sea for placement early to mid-week. >> so the images we're about to see here, let's just look at this one more time. the old containment cap was removed yesterday, and to replace it, it's going to take a little bit of time today as they put this new cap in place. they have to bolt it down. we're kind of seeing images right here from the rob...