Floating Drill

In 47 ft. of water off the coast of Louisiana last week, a strange-looking structure on ten giant steel "legs" hummed with activity. On its 203-ft.-long platform, propped 38 ft. above the water, lay all the tools, cables, pipe and machinery needed for oil drilling. In the center stood an oil derrick, at one end a helicopter landing space and a small portable bunkhouse. Built by Manhattan's DeLong Engineering & Construction Co. and J. Ray McDermott Co. of Houston, and leased to Humble Oil, the odd-looking dock-barge is the first of its kind in the world, promises to be a great help in the hunt for offshore oil.

Until now, deep-water offshore drilling has been done from permanent platforms propped up on steel pilings. To move to another site, all the drilling machinery had to be loaded onto barges and moved separately. The DeLong-McDermott barge comes completely equipped--even with its own caissons. They are dropped to the ocean floor through holes in the hull, then jacks lift the hull above the water, making a solid platform for drilling. When the driller wants to move, he simply lowers the hull to the water and pulls up the caissons. DeLong figures that the whole operation should take no more than 24 hours.

DeLong, which has been working on the 5,000,000-lb. barge with McDermott for the past year, is building a second unit capable of operating in 100 ft. of water, will lease it to Magnolia Petroleum Co. Barge No. 2 will be a deluxe model, with air-conditioned living quarters for a crew of 45.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.