Oil Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico

On June 3^rd, 1979, the offshore test well, Ixtoc I, experienced a wellhead blowout, which resulted in uncontrolled gushing of raw crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico for a period of 9 months. As a result of the blowout, the Ixtoc I platform caught fire and was destroyed, leaving an oil leak at the rate of 30,000 barrels per day with little knowledge of how to stop it. Response from the Mexico state-run petroleum monopoly, Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex), was immediate in attempting to recover the oiling collecting on the surface, but discussion of a permanent solution acknowledge that a relief well would have to be drilled and that the end of this crisis would be months away. Yet, as representatives of Pemex addressed the media, they couldn’t help but focus on how plentiful the oil was where the Ixtoc I had been drilling roughly 200 feet below the surface.