KENNER, La. (CN) - Federal hearings here on the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon focused on the blowout preventer and the cement seals of the rig, whose failures may have caused the fire, the deaths of 11 crew members and the disastrous oil spill. But the main defense against the blowout was the drilling mud that was removed shortly before the explosion, the panel's co-chairman, Coast Guard Capt. Hung Nguyen, and Minerals Management Service official Jason Matthews said on Tuesday.
Crew members of the Damon B. Bankston, a cargo ship leased by BP to haul away drilling mud, gave details of their response to the Deepwater Horizon's April 20 explosion. The rig burned and sank after killing 11 people and seriously wounding 17. But the crew members' stories of triumph and coordination were tempered by other testimony that indicated failures in regulation by the Minerals Management Service (MMS).
The Bankston's Captain Alwin Landry said he knew something was wrong on the Deepwater Horizon when he saw a shower of mud spray his vessel.
"It was kind of a black rain coming down on my boat," Landry said.
"At first I was kind of annoyed because I thought it was a broken hose. But when I saw the magnitude of the mud, I closed the well doors. I looked up to the derrick and saw mud coming out the top of the derrick. I called the oil rig and asked what was going on. After that, they advised me to go to 500-meter standby. Then there was a pause in their response and shortly after that, the first explosion on the rig occurred."
Landry said he couldn't get the Bankston 500 meters away from the Deepwater Horizon at first because he was still tied to it. Members of the panel appeared to be concerned that his boat had to be manually released.
Landry said he coordinated much of the first life-saving effort. Sixteen of the injured crewmembers from the rig were evacuated from his ship by helicopter.
Anthony Gervasio, the Bankston's chief engineer, testified that he fished several people out of the water near the burning rig with a small rescue boat and the help of another Bankston crew member. Some of the survivors who made it to a life raft couldn't get the raft loose from the burning rig. Other survivors were stuck in water that had caught fire.
"As we went over there, a life raft was lowered. We pulled three people out of the water and drove over to the life raft and tied a line onto their raft. We were proceeding to back up," Gervasio said. "The only problem with that was the life raft was tied off to the rig. We pulled off and couldn't go nowhere. Nobody had a knife."
Someone found a knife and the lifeboat was cut loose."
Landry said the captain of the Deepwater Horizon, Curt Kuchta, jumped into the water in the last minutes before the explosion.
Landry said Kuchta climbed from the 67-degree water onto the deck of the Bankston, and told Landry that the Deepwater Horizon crew had pressed the "kill switch" button to activate an emergency mechanism that would block the opening of the well, 1 mile deep in the sea.
"He acknowledged they pressed it and didn't know if it worked or not," Landry said.