BP Spill Opps Evacuation To Occur 5 Days Ahead Of Storm Force Winds

25th Jun 2010 17:57

HOUSTON (Dow Jones)--Spill responders plan to begin taking apart BP PLC's (BP, BP.LN) oil collection system about five days ahead of tropical storm force winds reaching the area of the Macondo well, the U.S. Coast Guard said Friday. Any storm would "realistically," disrupt the effort to contain the well for at least 14 days including time before and after the bad weather, U.S. Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said in a news conference Friday. The several drilling ships on sight would leave and about 1,800 workers would be evacuated. "We have a very robust contingency plan," Allen said. The plan would go into effect about 120 hours before the advent of gale force winds, which Allen described as 40 knots, which is about 46 miles per hour. The National Hurricane Center in Miami has set the minimum threshold for a Tropical Storm at 39 miles per hour. Some weather forecasters predict that first named storm of the season will develop over the weekend and move into southwestern portions of the Gulf of Mexico by Monday or Tuesday. "I can not emphasize enough that this storm will pose a serious threat to the all important efforts required to contain the country's worst oil spill disaster in history along with affecting operations across a large portion of the Gulf's energy production region," said Jim Rouiller, a senior energy meteorologist with Planalytics. The National Hurricane Center gives the low pressure area centered between the northeast coast of Honduras and Grand Cayman has a high chance, 70%, of becoming a tropical cyclone during the next 48 hours. The system is likely to become a tropical depression before it reaches the Yucatan Peninsula in a couple of days. An Air Force reconnaissance plane is scheduled to investigate this disturbance later Friday to determine if a tropical cyclone has formed. Computer weather models show the storm show the storm tracking either toward Mexico or toward Louisiana, according to Accuweather.com. If the storm gains strength and tracks toward the Texas and Louisiana coast, it will not only disrupt efforts to contain the Macondo well but it could also shut in production at other oil and gas wells in the Gulf of Mexico. -By Susan Daker, Dow Jones Newswires; (713) 547-9208; [email protected] (END) Dow Jones Newswires June 25, 2010 12:57 ET (16:57 GMT)