LLOG, Murphy shut down Gulf of Mexico platforms after plant explosion

Two oil and gas platforms in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico have reportedly been shut down as well as one gas pipeline following an explosion at an Enterprise Products Partners’ plant.

Bloomberg reported that the fire at Enterprise’s natural gas processing facility in Pascagoula, Mississippi was extinguished around 5 p.m. local time on Tuesday.

Enterprise said that there were no injuries nor impacts to the surrounding community and the fire was restricted to inside the facility. The Pascagoula plant receives natural gas from third party pipelines.

Due to the incident, the pipeline that sends gas to Enterprise’s plant from platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, the Destin pipeline, had to stop its service thus causing production halt at LLOG Exploration’s Delta House platform and Murphy Oil’s Thunder Hawk platform.

Enterprise said it is working with its customers and third party facility operators to keep them apprised of the situation and help determine other available options while the Pascagoula plant is out of service.

According to Reuters, LLOG will resume operations once downstream issues are resolved.

First production from the Delta House floating production system (FPS) started in April 2015. The platform reached the oil capacity of 80,000 barrels of oil per day in January 2016. Delta House has a production handling capacity of 100,000 BOPD, 240 MMCFD, and 40,000 BWPD.

Murphy-operated Thunder Hawk field, located in Mississippi Canyon 734 block in the Gulf of Mexico, produced first oil in July 2009.

Offshore Energy Today has reached out to Murphy Oil and LLOG seeking further details about production halt on their respective platforms, however we are yet to receive any response.

Offshore Energy Today Staff