Hamel also sent a copy of the letter to President Bush. It is unclear if either Browne or the Bush White House ever responded. BP would not comment for this story. But a majority of these allegations were repeated to West when he met with Hamel years later, and one explosive tidbit of information would form the basis of his criminal investigation into the company.
West said when he met Hamel he was told in no uncertain terms by Hamel that a section of pipeline at a caribou crossing - a "perfect habitat for corrosion" - was going to rupture and when it did it would be catastrophic.
"He said 'eventually, the pipeline will fail,'" West said.
Hamel explained that the pipeline was so fragile that new employees were warned not to lean against it or allow their keys to bang against the structure because of the damage it could cause.
Hamel also told West that BP failed to take steps to conduct an internal inspection of the pipeline through a lengthy process known as "smart pigging," which calls for sending electronic monitors, referred to as "smart pigs," through the pipeline to determine whether any defects exist, such as sediment buildup, on the pipeline walls. The monitors squeal as they travel through the pipeline and that's how the device got its name. It would later be revealed that BP had not conducted such an inspection for eight years and ignored and or retaliated against employees who suggested the company do so.
West said the first question he posed to Hamel was "how do you know this?"
"This is what the employees are telling me," West
said, recalling his conversation with Hamel. Hamel was unavailable to
comment for this story. "I told Chuck that if you don't have first hand
information there's not much that I can do. I asked if I can speak to
the employees. But he's extremely protective of them and wanted
assurances that I would keep their identities confidential and I
wouldn't bring any harm to them. I gave him my word and he arranged for
me to speak to these guys."
"Nightmares"
During the time that West met with Hamel, Congress was debating opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to exploration and BP, which operated the Prudhoe Bay oil field, the largest in North America and jointly owned by ExxonMobil, BP and ConocoPhillips, would have led the drilling efforts.
One of the concerns that employees expressed back then was that the frequent oil spills at Prudhoe Bay would also become a routine occurrence in ANWR because of BP's ongoing cost-cutting measures that left its operations vulnerable. And for that reason, some employees opposed calls to pass legislation to drill in ANWR.
In an interview with Truthout in 2005, Hamel said whistleblowers informed him and then-Interior Secretary Gale Norton, who at the time was touring the Prudhoe Bay oil fields, that the safety valves at Prudhoe Bay, which kick in in the event of a pipeline rupture, failed to close. Secondary valves that connect the oil platforms with processing plants also failed to close. And because the technology at Prudhoe Bay would be duplicated at ANWR, that meant there was a strong chance for an explosion and massive oil spills.
West said after he spoke with a handful of the BP whistleblowers he "started having nightmares."
"They told me there was going to be a massive spill on the North Slope and I need to be ready," West said. "I had these guys telling me about conversations they had with midlevel managers and documents they turned in exposing the pipeline corrosion and leak detection equipment on pipes that failed and ignored because it went off all the time. The employees were slapped down. They were given a lot of grief for having raised these issues. The BP culture is keep your mouth shut and your head down because nobody at BP wants to hear about it.
"That's why I knew this was a criminal case," West said. "BP turned a blind eye and deaf ear to their experts who predicted a major spill. It wasn't intentional act to put oil on the ground, but it was intentional act to ignore their employees. That's negligence and its criminal. "
West said he contacted colleagues in one of EPA's regional offices in around December 2005 that he had information an oil spill was likely to happen in the North Slope.
Prediction Becomes Reality
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