Assam gas well blowout on the verge of being controlled after 76 days

Dispur: The gas blowout and fire at Baghjan gas well in Tinsukia district of Assam has caught international attention. Gas Well Number 5 belonging to Oil India Limited started to leak gas and condensate uncontrollably on May 27 and two weeks later the leakage became a massive inferno which devastated a huge area in the vicinity.

Two firefighters of Oil India Limited got killed braving out to fight the inferno. The leakage and fire also displaced around 9000 villagers in the area besides destructing the flora and fauna of the area which is in the vicinity of Dibru Saikhowa Wildlife Sanctuary and a big wetland.

The Tinsukia district administration set up relief camps to give shelter to the displaced villagers. The Assam Fire Service department, OIL and ONGC experts tried to control the leakage and douse the blaze but they attained no success.

The concerned authorities were left with no other option than to seek the help of foreign experts to control the situation and subsequently a 3 member team from Singapore base "Alert Disaster Control" arrived at the scene.

This was followed by the arrival of 3 more experts of the agency from the US and Canada. Despite being the peak of pandemic COVID-19 and strict restrictions of people arriving from abroad, the 6 foreign experts jumped to disaster site right from day 1 of their arrival and have been putting all efforts to control the situation.

They are working with the logistics and support of the OIL, ONGC and state fire service department. Even conditions did not go well for foreign experts.

On July 22 there was another explosion at the gas well site and three experts from Alert Disaster Control got injured and they had to be rushed to the hospital for treatment.  Finally, after 76 days of the Baghjan blowout, good news came from the disaster site this morning (Aug 10).

According to Oil India Limited sources, the blowout is on the verge of being controlled. Experts were able to put the Blow Out Preventer (BOP) on the oil head of Gas Well Number 5.

This will be followed by efforts to douse the fire and followed by the final kill well operation. It is still not clear as how many days it will take to attain complete success in controlling the Baghjan blowout.