BP oil cap makes ‘significant progress’ – Coast Guard

Page last updated at 17:19 GMT, Monday, 12 July 2010 18:19 UK

BP’s undersea robots are working to fit the sealing cap

Engineers have made "significant progress" towards putting a new cap on the leaking oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, US Coast Guard commander Thad Allen has said.

Adm Allen, the commander overseeing the spill response, said: "This could lead to the shutting of the well."

He said BP hoped to close the cap and run a "pressure test" later in the day.

The cap is one of several devices BP has deployed as it works on a permanent solution – expected by mid-August.

News of the progress comes ahead of a planned visit to the region by First Lady Michelle Obama, who is expected to be briefed by officials and local leaders and speak to local community members.

The presidential commission to investigate the oil spill also began its hearings on Monday.

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President Barack Obama, who has visited the area several times, has labelled the spill the nation's worst-ever environmental disaster.

Coastal communities from Florida to Alabama rely on fishing and tourism, and many people believe the spill will wipe out their livelihoods.

'Critical point'

Work on the new containment cap, which BP hopes will eventually help to capture all of the leaking oil, began on Saturday.

"The hope is that we can slowly turn off the valves, close the capping completely and then test pressure to see how the well is performing," Adm Allen told CBS News on Monday.

The White House says containment efforts are at a "critical point".

"The new containment procedure will more than triple our containment capacity when it's all said and done," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told NBC television.

BP says it has spent $3.5bn (£2.3bn) on the response effort so far.

In addition, the firm has also set aside a $20bn fund to pay for the clean-up operation and other costs.

The value of BP shares has been almost halved by the disaster, but in early trading in London its share price continued a recent rally, climbing 5.5% to 384.7p.

In a statement, BP said installation of the sealing cap was "proceeding as planned".

Earlier, the firm's vice-president Kent Wells said he was pleased with the progress of the operation.

"We have carefully planned and practised this whole procedure. We've tried to work out as many of the bugs as we can," he said.

But he warned that "something unexpected" was bound to pose a challenge for the undersea robots installing the cap.

The explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig in April killed 11 people. Since then, thousands of barrels of oil have been spilling into the the sea every day.

BP's permanent solution to the leak is to drill two relief wells – a process it expects to be finished by mid-August.

The first of the relief wells reached a depth of 17,810ft on Sunday, and the tenth ranging run, a test to help zero in on the casing of the leaking well, was done.