Hopes rise as spill is stopped
The Marcellus blowout's cause remained unclear, but drillers prepared to start on a permanent fix.
CANTON, Pa. - Workers stopped the flow of liquid and natural gas from a well that spilled chemical-laced water for two days and were hoping to start on a permanent solution to control the well, drilling company officials said Friday.
Chesapeake Energy Corp., which was drilling the Marcellus Shale well near Canton in Bradford County, said the liquid leak was stopped Thursday.
After an equipment failure Tuesday night, a small amount of gas and thousands of gallons of liquid spilled from the well, crossing farm fields and entering a stream. The blowout's cause remained unclear, although Chesapeake spokesman Brian Grove said it took place in a wellhead connection.
Well-control specialists pumped ground-up tires, plastic bits, and other rubber material into the well to temporarily seal the leak. The company said Friday afternoon that it hoped to begin removing the malfunctioning well equipment and completing work on "structural integrity of the wellhead equipment."
State environmental regulators and nearby residents awaited results - probably available next week - from tests to determine the extent of contamination of nearby waterways and private water wells. A spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection said field checks found no cause for concern.
The DEP also issued a notice of violation to Chesapeake on Friday, an agency spokesman told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The notice asked the company to submit an analysis of what caused the wellhead failure, and said the DEP expected the company to "be in a stand-down mode on hydraulic fracturing" - which breaks up shale rock - as officials review what happened.
