Safe Influx performed a week’s worth of activities. These included:
- Interfacing the Safe Influx Automated Well Control system with the 40 year old land rig.
- Commissioning the system to ensure correct interfacing.
- Running the system to demonstrate functionality and training the Driller.
- Performing a series of system tests to demonstrate and prove up the functionality under different operational requirements.
- Performing system demonstrations for the benefit of Lloyd’s Register inspectors. This will enable the existing Lloyds Register Technology Qualification Certificate to be extended to traditional land rigs.
- Demonstrating the technology to the industry press.
- Demonstrating the technology to a cross section of over 30 industry VIPs, including operators, drilling contractors and well engineering companies.
Bryan Atchison, co-founder and managing director at Safe Influx, said “ Our successful field trial demonstrated that automation can provide support to the driller, dramatically reducing our exposure to Human Factors. The technology also provides a significant safety, time and cost advantage on day to day drilling operations, as influxes or kicks can be shut-in more quickly thus resulting in much smaller shut-in volumes and therefore much more manageable well control incidents”, he added.
Malcolm Banks, well construction solution centre manager at the OGTC, commented: “The Safe Influx Automated Well Control system has the potential for significant improvement on how high potential risk well control events are detected and responded to”.