Deepwater Horizons

In 2010, our nation experienced one of the most harmful oil spills in national history. The spill happened in the Gulf of Mexico on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. This oil rig was owned by BP Oil at the time of the explosion.

The spill began April 20, 2010, and was finally sealed on September 19, 2010. Over the course of these four disastrous months, eleven crew members went missing, and over two-hundred and ten million gallons of oil was leaked into the Gulf.

BP oil was forced to pay over eighteen billion dollars in fines to clean up the spill. The spill covered birds, sea life, and people in oil as soon as they touched the water. The fines paid by BP will never amount to the number of lives lost due to the company’s’ carelessness.

Recently, Peter Berg, producer of many hit TV shows, directed a movie that portrayed the events that occurred on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. The movie, Deepwater Horizon, was a hit in the box office, igniting a flame in the audience’s mind to do their part in preventing, and cleaning up a disaster such as this.

The movie began by showing how Mike Williams, and other future crew member’s at home lives were before the accident. Williams, an actual crew member of the real Deepwater Horizon rig, was played by Mark Whalberg.

The movie follows William’s journey to the rig, and when he arrives it is apparent that the rig is in no shape to drill for oil. The phones don’t work, the gas alarms are broken, and the cement sealing the the ocean floor together hadn’t been tested before the cement crew left the rig.

Several shortcuts were taken in preparing the rig for drilling, yet the supervisors of the company were in a hurry to get drilling in hopes of getting the company out of debt. Despite the worriedness of all of the crew members, the supervisors persuaded them to begin drilling as soon as possible.

The crew members agreed to their persuasion under one condition; they would only begin drilling if they ran several expensive tests to ensure that their safety wouldn’t be compromised. From the deck of the rig, the tests seem to be going well. However, the camera shows the audience that underwater something is very wrong.

The crew, not aware of these problems underwater, begins the drilling. As soon as they begin, everything is fine. Oil is flowing up onto the rig as it should, and the crew slowly begins to relax.

The relaxation amongst the rig is broken by a pressure alarm sounding, indicating that the pipes may blow at any moment. Instinctively, the crew trys disconnecting the pipes, which would alleviate all of the pressure. However, the system is faulty, and the pipes explode, causing the rig to turn into chaos.

The explosion wakes the whole crew, injuring several, and killing a few. The crew decides to abandon the rig. They begin making their way to the lifeboats in hopes of making it out alive. Despite several severe injuries, everyone who wasn’t killed by the explosion made it off the boat alive, onto the nearby rescue boat.

Regardless of everyone making it off alive, their lives would never be the same. Families of the crew members wait at a nearby hotel in hopes that their loved one walks through the door into their arms. Several families reconnect with their loved ones, however, some families are left there waiting for news to come that their family member hadn’t made it out alive.

Even the survivors did not totally make it out. Mentally, they are distraught by the disaster, but physically, they are able to feel the love of their family once again.

The film ends by paying individual respect to each of the crew members that unfortunately did not make it out alive.