The “top kill” on the leaking gulf oil well remained a brute-force battle Thursday afternoon between drilling mud and high-pressure oil and gas surging from deep below the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. Success remains uncertain, a BP executive said, and it could be another 24 to 48 hours before the outcome is known.
“Success has been in the ability to pump against the well. Next step is to get more fluid flowing down the well. Until the well is stopped and cemented, it will not be killed,” BP managing director Bob Dudley stated in a company press release Thursday afternoon.
Earlier in the day, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the national incident commander for the federal government, said in media interviews that the top kill was working as planned and that oil and gas were no longer leaking.
“They’ve been able to stabilize the wellhead,” he told a New Orleans radio station. “They’ve stopped the hydrocarbons from coming up.”