Pictures from PapaNasty

[patw]

I received these just a few minutes ago from Papa.

[donjoy]

Are these guys actually drilling, or merely dumping rusted junk into the water? I'm unfamiliar with the process, so it's difficult to tell what's going on from the pics. If they're drilling, do they have (or do they need) permission to do so? Is the environment fair game to anybody who has the (rusted) equipment to exploit it? That's one scary looking vessel!

[patw]

Please check out this thread for the whole story. This rusted bucket has been on the reef for two years since it floated there after a hurricane.
http://abacoforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1135

[SamFamAustin]

DonJoy maybe the locals will know about active drilling near Walker's Cay way up on the north end, but this here ship the GOULET is nothing but a 1947 rust bucket that ran up on the reefs and punctured her hull after she broke loose from her anchor. No way it could have been a working drill ship with equipment so deteriorated. Now this is hearsay and opinion on my part, but I live near a port where offshore oil & gas exploration is very active - Brownsville, Texas - so I know what a real operation looks like. At the risk of extreme BS and conjecture, it could have been that the GOULET was positioned down there at Walkers so as to show progress on an active drilling lease, and nothing more. It is fairly typical to require that oil & gas leases have active status before renewing them. Again, just a wild guess. -Sam

[PELLUCID]

I've raked up lots of muck on this subject over the past 2 or 3 years. Hope Mr. Waters didn't mind too much when I posted the tail numbers of the small planes he flew into Walkers Cay a while back... or the pictures of the Louis J. Goulet transiting the locks in Ontario... or the registration info for the ships... or all the other wonderful things one can Google these days. And I hope my little spoof press release with the new Bahamian $10 bill didn't cause him too much heartburn when some kind friends passed it along to senior government officials.

I do commend him for finally stepping up to the plate and paying to have the barge removed.

It doesn't change my opinion that Liberty Gas & Oil is a company designed for the benefit of management, not investors.

Bob Knaus

[SamFamAustin]

Hey Bob and y'all,

The grapevine says we should be extremely grateful for the money to decommission and sink the GOULET because the powers that be could pull the plug at any time - a very sensitive subject. If we can hold the banter until the Sinking Party in 130 feet of water, "X" marks the spot, I think it would be quite beneficial. Hey I'm the worst offender so no big deal. :cool:

I wasn't aware of this fear until just now ... the locals are quite concerned.
sammie