Katrina Targets Gulf of Mexico Oil

123jump.com Staff
28 Aug, 2005
New York City

As hurricane Katrina gathered speed and strength to level 5, major oil companies have announnced production shut-downs in the Gulf of Mexico region. The region produces 1.5 million barrles of oil per day and 10 billion cubic feet of natural gas. The potential landfall on Monday morning near New Orleans may cause severe weather conditions in and aroud the city.

Katrina, the fourth hurricane in a season of eleven Atlantic coast tropical activities, is on its way as Category 5 hurricane to somewhere close to New Orleans, Louisiana. Katrina, hurricane category one, managed to down power lines, trees, and flood much of South Florida caused nine deaths.

The month of August has witnessed so far five storms including tropical storms Harvey Jose, tropical depression Ten, and two hurricanes Irene and Katrina.

The month of July saw unprecedented tropical cyclone activity in the Atlantic basin with the development of five storms tropical storms including two hurricanes. Tropical storms Cindy, Franklin and Gert were joined by hurricane Dennis and Emily.

According to the NHC, the previous record for named storms that formed in July was four. The two major hurricanes that developed during the month tied a record set in 1916. The July activity follows an unusually active month of June.

The predicted seasonal totals include the considerable activity that has already occurred prior to this update (7 tropical storms and 2 major hurricanes). Therefore, for the remainder of the season, NHC expects additional 11-14 tropical storms, with 7-9 becoming hurricanes, and 3-5 of these becoming major hurricanes.

Category one hurricane Katrina, after leaving more than 1.5 million people without electricity for more than a day, is on its way as category 4 hurricane to Port Fourchon, Louisiana. The second landfall of this year’s fourth hurricane is expected to directly reach oil and gas infrastructure in the Gulf of Mexico.

According to National Hurricane Center, Katrina strengthened to Category 5 early this morning. The fall of hurricane is predicted to be anywhere between western Louisiana to Panama City, Florida.

According to U.S. Minerals and Management Services, the region of Gulf of Mexico accounts for daily crude oil production between 1.5 million barrels of oil and 10 and 11 billion cubic feet of natural gas. The region has seen intense level of activity in the last three years in search of energy using deep water drilling technology.

Port Fourchon is important oil and gas city for the nation’s domestic and import oil activities. About 13% of U.S. oil import flows through the port and 27% of domestic production flows through the pipeline hub located in the city according to MMS.

Hurricane Katrina's projected path across the Gulf continues to move west. As of late Friday evening, Shell has evacuated a total of 465 offshore personnel and will continue to evacuate all remaining Gulf of Mexico staff, with the exception of those at our assets far to the west. Total planned evacuations for Saturday include 554 additional personnel.

Several other major oil companies including Murphy Oil, Anadarko Petroleum, Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and BHP have announced production shut-downs totaling 600,000 barrels of oil per day production.