- It's like an airplane taking off on a runway.
You get to a point and you have to go.
And that's where we are now.
- [Narrator] Deep in the Gulf of Mexico,
a crew of more than 400 spread out over four vessels
is in the final, critical stages of connecting
the Amazing Appomattox Oil Platform
to the oil field beneath the seabed.
It's taken seven years and 15 million man-hours
to get the largest oil platform Shell has ever built
to the point where it can start production.
This is the story of its installation
and how Appomattox came to draw its first oil.
- Hello.
- [Garry] Asim it's Garry.
- Garry, I can see you're struggling with something.
What's happening?
- [Narrator] Engineer Asim Modi is
in the middle of a monumental decision.
For more than seven months,
he's been aboard the Balder deepwater construction vessel,
overseeing the welding and laying of more
than 200-miles of pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico.
Whether that pipe successfully hooks up with
the nearby Appomattox platform depends on this moment.
- The two pipes have to line up so there's
no more than half a millimeter
difference between the fit up.
For four years we've been doing all
this engineering design to get to that stage,
and it comes down to half a millimeter.
It's kind of astonishing.
And is it a critical weld or a non-critical weld?
- [Garry] It's a noncritical.
- It's covered by the ECE
so let's talk to Phil and also Tom.
- Each weld receives a different amount of stress
in a different amount of fatigue damage over its life.
And so, depending on where it is,
the criteria for a good weld is very different.
- [Garry] This is Garry.
- Garry, this is Asim.
Tom was on the line.
He verified what I said.
He had allowed to go to .75,
and so on this occasion,
that weld is good to go, okay?
- [Garry] Okay, I'll call the tower
and let them know we're good to go.
- Cheers, buddy.
- [Garry] Thank you.
- [Narrator] With the go ahead given,
the team finish up the final pipe work,
preparing for the crucial moment when
it will be connected to the Appomattox.
- One of the dilemmas is with such
a large tree system, 200,000 pounds,
how are we actually going to install this safely?
- [Narrator] Design engineers are working
with a subsea system that's almost double
the size of any other Shell has previously used.
The team needs to lower the asset,
roughly the weight of a space shuttle,
7,400 feet to the seabed,
and land it on a target less than half an inch wide.
- So, there's not a lot of room for error
and we've got some very sensitive components
which we have to make sure mate correctly
from the tree into the top of that well.
- [Narrator] To set the subsea tree
in place a giant crane and ROV are used.
The team guides the tree a mile-and-a-half down
in a complicated procedure that takes
about 24 hours to complete.
Once the tree nears the target,
the ROV operators move from monitoring to full engagement,
making sure the tree doesn't go astray
and land in the mud on the seabed.
With laser-like precision they land it perfectly
on the narrow target that's less than half an inch wide.
The tree's funnel system then self-adjusts
to ensure all parts lock together.
- It was a pretty amazing feat but I have a great team,
specialists of all kinds who are able to do amazing things.
- [Narrator] With the subsea systems in place,
it's time for the Balder to hand
the final pipeline over to the Appomattox.
The process is called a riser transfer
and it requires four vessels to perform complex movements,
in perfect synchronicity, on the water.
- The transfer is dramatic.
It's a really heavy load being transferred
from one vessel to the host.
We pay our chain out so the Bylgia can recover the chain.
The Bylgia and Balder both connect the chain to the riser.
Then basically they lower the riser
into the water until we take the load.
- [Narrator] The Balder, which rivals
the size of the Appomattox,
comes within a few feet of the platform.
So, the control rooms on all sides
stay in constant communication,
making sure the vessels don't come in contact.
- The most critical point is that you have
to make sure the facility is positioned
in the right direction that the vessels need
in order to place the riser into the basket.
- If you miss one step,
if you have a lot of weight on it
and one of the chocks doesn't close properly,
well then you have a potential problem
that everything can take off on you.
- [Noah] Things can clash so we constantly have people
spotting to we make sure we don't have any steel touching.
- This is the point where most of the interfaces
that we've been working as a team
for the last few years all come together.
- [Narrator] A steel cable is cut,
allowing the pipeline that will bring up
the oil to be connected to the Appomattox.
- We're all stop.
- All right guys, good job.
Risers in the basket.
- Okay fellas.
- Nice.
Good job, Paul.
- Stephen.
- Way to go, Stephen.
- When you can safely get it in the basket
and there's no incidents and the day is done.
It's a good feeling.
- [Narrator] With installation complete
it's now time to attempt to bring up oil from
the subsea reservoir to the Appomattox for the first time.
- We're just southeast of the Mississippi,
about 100 miles offshore.
The depth of water is 7,400 feet
and we're drilling to a good four and a half miles down.
- [Narrator] Working at these depths is
a complicated and time-consuming procedure.
- You're working over a mile and a half beneath the sea,
you can't reach out and touch things.
And then you put a reservoir that's
25,000 feet below sea level,
everything has to be done by logs
and visualizations and remote operated vehicles.
- [Narrator] While the Appomattox platform
was being constructed,
prep work was started on the wells getting them ready
for the day when the first oil would flow.
- We kinda did things in phases.
We just finished VX2 which is the third well,
so we really have three wells in the ground now.
- [Narrator] But just as things are looking good to go
there's some bad news.
A storm moves in which could make
striking first oil a lot more complicated.
- Weather can be very challenging in the offshore industry.
That does have a propensity to work things
that are normally safe, less safe.
- We get weather throughout the day.
We get various status sources that
report to us about what to expect from weather.
- [Narrator] This information is fed into a computer
which uses global positioning from satellites rather
than anchoring to maintain the vessel's position.
- We have six thrusters and six engines
and those automatically change their position
and thrusting force to keep us
in a really tight watch circle.
It's actually more precise than anchoring.
- [Narrator] After hours of being battered by the storm,
it begins to subside.
The crew's calm heads pay off
and everything is kept stable until the storm passes.
- Everybody responded really well.
We all jumped up, and ran into the bridge,
got on the phone with the drill floor.
Everybody did exactly what they were supposed to do.
- [Narrator] With the storm over,
the work continues to achieve Appomattox's first oil.
- The Appomattox is just about ready for us to take the oil
from the wells and now working those to completion.
- [Narrator] As the moment of first oil draws near,
the excitement begins to mount on the Appomattox.
- As you move towards the last bits and pieces,
everybody starts realizing that
you're close to the end game.
- So much work has been done over the past several years.
A lot of steps have gone into play
from preparation for first oil.
- We're getting so close to the end.
And everybody's amped up and everybody's, you know, ready.
- [Narrator] The Shell team are spread
across Texas and Louisiana.
They wait patiently for news that oil
has finally reached the platform.
- Part of the team was in the New Orleans office
and of course a very important part of
the team was offshore actually making it happen.
- Come in Joe.
I'm gonna start up motor 2752.
- [Joe] Copy that, go ahead.
- Alright, roger that.
I'm gonna start increasing pressure.
Temperature is rising.
It looks like the well is flowing.
Good job.
- [Narrator] Seven years since
the Appomattox project first began
and taking more than 15 million man-hours,
the oil is finally flowing.
It's an emotional moment for everyone involved.
- The well opened.
They said the well is flowing.
Everything worked well topsides.
We had really stable flow which is exciting.
- Reaction was both relief on one hand
and a feeling of immense responsibility on the other.
- [Allison] There was a lot of handshakes, high fives.
Some hugs, maybe some tears.
- [Marno] People were dancing in the corridors,
jumping with joy because Appomattox had started up.
- You don't get too many opportunities
like this in your career
to bring on a facility in this magnitude.
I get goosebumps just talking about it because I'm so proud.
- [Narrator] It's an immense accomplishment
for everyone who's helped design,
construct, install, and operate the Appomattox.
- It's been an enormous team achievement
but this is not the end.
There's a duty now to take care
of this asset for the next 40 years.
- Personally, I'm very humbled to be part of this project.
It's exciting, but it's also one of
the most humbling things I've ever done.
- I'm proud to be a part of this team.
You sit back and reflect and go, wow, what a journey.
- [Narrator] Subscribe to Shell's YouTube channel
to see more on the Amazing Appomattox Oil Platform
and other technology and engineering films from Shell.