Seal completed on BP’s Gulf of Mexico disaster well

WASHINGTON - The final seal on BP’s ruptured oil well in the Gulf of Mexico is complete, the US official in charge of the disaster said Sunday.

Five months after the worst marine pollution disaster in US history began, tests showed that the final cement plug of the well 4,000 metres under the floor of the ocean was holding, said Thad Allen, the retired head of the US Coast Guard who is directing the recovery operations.

“I commend the response personnel, both from the government and private sectors, for seeing this vital procedure through to the end,” said Allen in a statement. “And although the well is now dead, we remain committed to continue aggressive efforts to clean up any additional oil we may see going forward.”

The cement pressure test was completed at 5.54 a.m. local time (1154 GMT) and confirmed by the US Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

“Additional regulatory steps will be undertaken but we can now state, definitively, that the Macondo well poses no continuing threat to the Gulf of Mexico,” said Allen.

The explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in April killed 11 workers and is believed to have led to the release of 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, the worst environmental disaster in US history.