The math isn’t adding up in Assumption Parish, and some parish officials are worried about what might be happening underground near a Bayou Corne area sinkhole.
State Department of Natural Resources scientists said they think a subterranean Texas Brine Co. salt cavern failed, allowing earth to partially fill the 2,250-foot-long vault and ultimately cause the sinkhole to form about 200 feet to the northwest of the cavern’s top.
Parish officials say the volume of the brine-filled sinkhole is much smaller than the amount of displaced earth now in the cavern, prompting worries about other unknown subterranean voids or gaps left in the area by the shifted sediments that could lead to further disturbance at the surface.
With this uncertainty as well as other factors — such as the natural gas still trapped underground — officials said the end date of the evacuation of the Bayou Corne and Grand Bayou communities remains unclear.
“Until we figure out what is going on below the surface, it would be very negligent on our part to ask these people to come back into their homes,” Assumption Parish Sheriff Mike Waguespack said.
The evacuation has been in place since the evening of Aug. 3, hours after the sinkhole was found south of La. 70 South on Texas Brine’s leased property.
The evacuation affects about 150 homes.
The Texas Brine cavern was carved from the Napoleonville Dome after years of solution mining and is near the salt dome’s western edge. The dome is a 1-by-3-mile solid salt deposit that has been used for brine production, hydrocarbon storage and oil and gas exploration for many years.
In the Oct. 11 order from state Commissioner of Conservation James Welsh laying out the current theory on the failure cavern and the sinkhole’s formation, Welsh ordered Texas Brine to take a variety of steps to test and monitor the cavern and sinkhole.
One of those involves doing three-dimensional seismic surveying in the area around the sinkhole to assess just the kind of questions the parish officials are asking.
The order, which lays out a series of deadlines for the various tests and monitoring, requires that Texas Brine submit a plan for the seismic work next month.
Sonny Cranch, Texas Brine spokesman, reiterated Friday that the company would comply with the order and said the plan to collect the geophysical data is in the developmental stage.
“We expect to submit our plan on or before Nov. 13, the date specified in the order,” he said.
Other developments also came to light in recent days, company, parish and state officials said:
Texas Brine removed 1,320 barrels of oil from its failed cavern between Tuesday afternoon and Thursday evening and replaced the oil with an equal amount of brine for cavern stability. The company was testing Friday where the oil and brine are located inside the cavern.
The company plans to finish a mandated vent well on its property to remove natural gas from the underlying aquifer early this week while scientists working for DNR are trying to get gas to flow from two finished vent wells north of La. 70.
In the past three weeks, Waguespack and the Assumption Parish Police Jury have sent Texas Brine bills for parish expenses in responding to the sinkhole emergency, totaling $125,000 and $196,000, respectively.
Encompassing more than 4 acres on its surface and 449 feet deep, the funnel-shaped sinkhole has a volume of 550,000 cubic yards, according to the latest estimates from Texas Brine.
But an estimated 3.3 million cubic yards of sediment along with oil and gas flowed into the formerly brine-filled salt cavern after a breach along the cavity’s lower edge.
Scientists have said they believe it is this movement of material into the cavern that released pressure in the compacted earth underground along the edge of the salt dome and caused the sinkhole to surface in the forest swamps on Texas Brine’s leased property.
According to the accounting of Waguespack and Assumption Parish Homeland Security Director John Boudreaux, though, some 2.7 million cubic yards of displaced material — now inside the Texas Brine cavern — are not reflected in the brine-filled space of the sinkhole.
Boudreaux and Waguespack said it is their worry that the possible voids or gaps underground left by the 2.7 million cubic yards of earth that shifted could lead to sinkholes appearing in other locations.
In early August, DNR scientists presented a worst-case scenario for the sinkhole.
Under that model, which was based on a complete collapse of the Texas Brine cavern and a displacement of its entire volume, scientists estimated the existing sinkhole would reach 1,400 feet in diameter and still be far from any residences.
The current failure filled about three-fourths of the cavern’s space with earth. The sinkhole is roughly 550 feet across and has had occasional edge collapses that incrementally increased its surface dimensions, according to figures provided by the parish, DNR and Texas Brine.
Boudreaux said the assumption all along has been that the existing sinkhole would continue to grow, but last week he asked who is to say whether another sinkhole might form somewhere else.
DNR spokesman Patrick Courreges said none of the scientists and officials have seen any indications of that happening, but they are still being cautious until they fully understand the mechanics of the incident.
Assumption Parish Police Jury President Marty Triche said parish officials have to rely on scientific findings to make decisions about the evacuation order and will err on the side of caution and not put people in harm’s way.
He said the evacuation order remains a work in progress as officials consider the status of the vent wells aimed at removing natural gas from underground and find answers about whether any voids are actually underground.
“Obviously, it has been a long time, and still there is no definitive answer yet. The scary part is at what point will we get a definitive answer,” he said. “I am not sure we will ever get that.”
A meteor the size of a small car that hit Earth’s upper atmosphere, exploded, and left debris over California Wednesday evening might link to ten explosions in north Louisiana two nights before that eye witnesses described as a meteor shower but officials ruled out as a source of bright lights, loud booms, homes shaking, windows breaking and Camp Minden’s under ground bunker arsenal exploding.
The cause of North Louisiana’s Camp Minden military explosion that shook residents last Monday night is still unknown, officials say. . .
They shut the observation well late Sat. after they brought “a mixture of hydrocarbons and brine to the surface”. They shut down (til at least Monday) to observe if more hydrocarbons accumulate in the well.
Texas Brine advised that clean up in the sinkhole continued throughout the past weekend.
The Shaw Group has advised that they are preparing for observation well #4, on the south side of Highway 70. They are also preparing to re-work vent wells #1 & #2 (on Dugas & Leblanc property east of the community) in an effort to vent gas from the aquifer.
Webster Parish Woodland Fire Related to Sinkhole Methane???
Just Asking.
Google HIDES all info on search terms “Burn Ban Lake Bistineau” and “Lake Bistineau”… But we clearly saw the local Minden, Lousiana newspaper The Minden Press Heraldin the beginning of this video dated Oct. 17 :
DHS Issues An IMMEDIATE BURN BAN for Lake Bistineau Louisiana!!!
An apparent campfire gone wrong on Friday, October 12, prompted Webster Parish Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness Director John Stanley to issue a burn ban in the bed of Lake Bistineau.
“They were on four wheelers,” he said. “They rode all over the lake bed and they’d built a campfire it looked like, because there were chairs in a circle around it. When they left it unattended, it got out.
The Webster Parish Police Jury and Webster Parish Office of Homeland Security have issued a Burn Ban for the Lake Bistineau Lake Bed effective immediately.
All camp fires, trash fires, and any other open flames are prohibited on the Lake Bed of Lake Bistineau in Webster Parish.
The ban will be in effect until further notice.
The lake is in NW Louisiana near the big explosion and FAR FROM THE SINKHOLE.
Emergency leaders in Assumption Parish said they saw improvements at the Bayou Corne sinkhole site Friday afternoon in terms of crude-soaked vegetation, but admit there is still no solution or cause of the disaster. . . .
They say they got the oil out, all patched up, under control and … HOORAY! ,,, the sinkhole has NOT expanded at all! Wow! Are they ever efficient!Oct. 20 update – see for yourself:
Louisiana National Guard has issued a statement Friday on Camp Minden's Monday night explosions and 7000 feet mushroom cloud, but Hazardous Materials Unit in Baton Rouge and others investigating could take months before determining the cause,officials said Friday about the area that will remain off-limits until after completing cleanup.
Below is a statement released Friday by the Louisiana National Guard about the explosion at Camp Minden just before midnight Monday.
On Monday night the Camp Minden post security heard a loud sound which could have been a possible explosion. Subsequently, the post security physically surveyed the camp in accordance with established protocols and conferred with contractor tenants who stated that they were not able to confirm the origination of the sound.
Upon daylight on Tuesday morning, a Camp Minden tenant organization, Explo Inc., discovered that one of their storage areas had exploded and reported the incident to the Louisiana National Guard. Following this report, the Louisiana National Guard notified local authorities and the Louisiana State Police of the explosion in accordance with standard protocol.
The substance that exploded was a smokeless powder and does not pose a threat outside of Camp Minden. Explo is currently conducting clean-up operations of the site. The incident is under investigation by the LSP. The incident area is a restricted area and will remain off limits to anyone other than authorized individuals due to normal operational security and safety requirements.
Multiple witnesses have reported seeing bright objects with tails falling from the sky toward earth before a bright light and loud explosion sounds.
(Watch on this page at the left KSLA News report on Camp Minden explosion.)
Officials report that a bunker loaded with explosives, leased to a private company Explo Systems Inc. is the source of the explosion in the L-1 area toward the central eastern part of Camp Minden. It is now off-limits to reporters, officials say, for safety reasons.
After Amy Mealey and her family lived a few miles from Camp Minden for five years, they had grown so accustomed to military activity sounds, she told the News Star that she no longer noticed them, until just before 11:30 p.m. Monday.
"I honestly thought we were being bombed," said Mealey. "It was the scariest thing I've ever been through."
Just before going to bed, Mealey, a mother of two "felt an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach — like a rolling thunder in the distance," News Star reported.
"It was getting closer and closer, and I felt everything moving with me. I could literally feel it moving toward me."
The Meaely's reported that their house shook, shattering a lead window and blowing out its frame.
Hazmat crews began collecting photo evidence from the scene Tuesday to send to the Hazardous Materials Unit in Baton Rouge for it to try to determine what caused the powerful blasts.
News reports had previously stated that at least ten blasts occurred. Multiple witnesses apparently reported that they saw something falling down from the sky towards the earth before the mushroom cloud was created.
"After they conclude their investigation, they submit it to Baton Rouge where a whole other team examines it," said Louisiana State Police Trooper Matt Harris. That way we leave no stone unturned and everything is covered.
"If you miss something, it can be very crucial to the outcome of the investigation. You want things done right, especially with explosive materials and stuff like that."
Camp Minden Training Site (CMTS) is Louisiana National Guard’s (LANG) newest military training site.
In 1941, the Federal Government acquired 15,868 acres of farms, farmland and private lands to construct The Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant (LAAP).
In January 2005, that entire area that had belonged to the U.S. Government as LAAP totaling 14,995 acres was deeded to the State of Louisiana under control of the Louisiana Military Department.
Vacherie Salt Dome is ten miles south of Minden. It is about 270 miles north of Napoleonville Salt Dome where methane leaks increasingly bubble and thousands of earthquakes have occurred along with a sinkhole, that has gown to 4 acres large since early August, prompting state of emergency and mandatory evacuation declarations.
"If there is enough methane in the air, just about anything (like a rock hitting another rock, causing a spark) could ignite explosions," physicist Steve Knudsen said in an email Friday.
While some believe Monday night's explosions could not have been caused by a meteorite because the objects are cold when they reach Earth, Knudsen and chair of West Virginia University Department of Astrophysics Dr. Duncan Lorimer refute that.
"Meteors burn up up but meteorites hit the ground and are hot on impact," Dr. Lorimer told Dupré Friday in a separate email.
"Depending on the size of the meteor, it would not necessarily be cold by the time it hits the earth," explained Knuden.
"[O]f course, they have sufficient energy to heat up and burn in the atmosphere, so if there is any methane there then that could happen," replied Lorimer, after asked if a meteor's impact on methane in Louisiana could cause an explosion.
The "Camp Minden" explosion was felt in three states, in communities including Lake Bisteneau community that was particularly hard hit by the blasts.
According to a Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality map, Lake Bisteneau is part of the same water system as the sinkhole area where methane has reached explosive level and is life-threatening, according to officials.
A meteor hitting methane could have caused the Camp Minden explosions, but authorities have not publicly released this critically important information. The heaviest of meteorite showers are predicted this weekend.
“Questions are still being asked as to why did it take authorities so long to identify that an explosion had occurred on the post,” asks Rod White, reporting for KTBS on Wednesday.
Monday night, Oct. 15, around 11:26 pm, a large explosion felt in three states occurred in Louisiana's Webster Parish, reportedly approximately 4 miles southwest of Minden, 28 miles east of Shreveport. The initial event reportedly occurred at Latitude/Longitude 35.578 N, -93.351 W, in the borders of Camp Minden Army ammunition plant. Large flashes had been previously observed, citizens were shaken out of beds and windows shattered during the late night hours.
The dark or another oil and gas disaster?
“Authorities are blaming just the dark for their inability to find the source of that huge explosion," stated White.
Matt Harris with Louisiana State Police, Troop "G" says it was like searching for a needle in a haystack to find the origin of the explosion, according to KTBS.
"There's no way to visually find it and being that it was dark and foggy you couldn't really find a smoke cloud," Harris said.
Citizens, however, are not buying those explanations. Digging only a little deeper, one sees the connection between north Louisiana's Monday night explosion area and south Louisiana's sinkhole area: The areas are joined by that water system of interconnected aquifers.
"Some reports say it was a ammunition bunker explosion, others say a meteor hit, other suggest military weapon tests," Examiner reader Ron Bartlett commented Thursday. "[R]egardless, it was a massive explosion with lots of fire and with all this gas in the air, growing sink holes and underground high pressure oil and gas storage caverns - it could have set off of a chain reactions of explosions."
Methane is in the Assumption Parish waterways, specifically the aquifer. Only eight days before the “Minden explosion,” on Oct. 8, it was reported that the methane gas pressure had become so high, it had reached an explosive level.
John Boudreaux, director of the Assumption Parish Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness has said there are concerns that the gas can build pressure under the clay layer that lies above the aquifer. Once the aquifer reaches a pressure greater than 75 to 85 pounds per square inch, the clay layer might not hold back the accumulated gas, according to Boudreaux and geologists.
“And then it could be a problem, because you do not know where the weak point would be until after it has already done its thing,” said Boudreaux.
Bartlett is only one of several citizens questioning the sinkhole methane and Camp Minden explosion connection.
On the popular Godlike Productions website, Rhonda Yocum wrote what she emailed to Dupré, "I pulled up Google Earth and stuck a pin in Minden, Lake Bistineau, Bayou Corne, and Lake Peigneur. I panned out to see exactly what these places might have in common...
"These 4 places are ALL located on the same aquifer," Keller wrote.
"I believe that the methane is traveling up that aquifer (under enormous pressure) and that the meteor which was spotted by numerous people on the night of October 15th, impacted somewhere closer to Lake Bistineau and ignited a methane pocket, causing that massive explosion and percussion wave," Yocum stated. "Residents closer to Lake Bistineau reported more intense damage, pressure wave, shaking.... than those in Minden."
“A resident of the Lake Bistineau area reports that it almost shook their house off its foundation,” the News Starreported Tuesday.
Sheriff Gary Sexton said that, as he was driving in the Springhill-Cullen area, he saw two flashes from the south -- before the blasts began.
“Earlier in the morning, Sexton said there was a 'possibility that a meteor did hit the ground' in the area, but that theory was put to rest with the confirmation of the blast at the Camp Minden bunker,” WAFBreported.
Numerous other eyewitness reports explained they saw what appeared to be meteors, with tails, falling before the blasts that occurred just before midnight.
“About this time here in Stephens City VA, while walking my dog I had seen what looked like a shooting star - it had a tail- or another star immediately (sic) behind it,” Maria Teresa commented Tuesday on the Examiner. “[If] you blinked, you missed it. I wonder if this is what I had seen. It was redder than a shooting star - or the second object was - just like a flash it was gone…”
“It was after 11, I am sure,” Teresa wrote. “[We} took the dog out for his last walk which we normally do… I had looked up right before it was gone. Don’t know if it means anything, but saw similar sight last night a lot earlier… same type of shooting start but only one - same place in sky - pretty prominent for the sky not to be dark yet,” she stated.
New York Daily Newssays the explosion was caused by military, not a meteorite. It also noted that military is investigating the explosions.
A visible meteorite shower had been predicted this week, peaking this weekend.
“A meteor shower spawned by history's most famous comet will peak this weekend,” reports NBC News. “Orionid meteor shower to light up night skies this weekend,” its news article was titled.
Could there be more methane explosions in Louisiana this weekend?
“The Orionid meteor shower will reach its zenith overnight from Saturday to Sunday as Earth plows through debris shed by Halley's Comet on its path around the sun,” NBC reports. “The most impressive display should come a few hours before dawn Sunday, when our planet hits the densest patch of Halley's detritus.
"Flakes of comet dust hitting the atmosphere should give us dozens of meteors per hour," said Bill Cooke, head of the Meteoroid Environment Office at NASA's Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
If meteors struck the nation's oil and gas capital, Louisiana, it is not beyond possibility that the hot materials could ignite methane if the methane is in the air, according to the physicists interviewed.
If a meteor were large enough to penetrate refinery tanks or pipelines, it could cause explosions. The same would occur if a meteor hit a munitions dump, such as the one at Camp Minden that exploded.
The Bayou Corne sinkhole disaster "is made all the more worrisome" because of a nearby Crosstex Energy LP's "well containing 1.5 million barrels of liquid butane, a highly volatile liquid that turns into a highly flammable vapor upon release,” CNNhas reported. Assumption Parish Sheriff Mike Waguespack said a breach of that well could be "catastrophic.”
Something unexpectedly triggered an emergency flare 40 feet high at that Crosstex well last week. An explosion at that well would be in the range of one and a half B83 thermonuclear (hydrogen) bombs, according to scientists.
"This is extremely serious," Kim Torres, spokeswoman for the Office of Emergency Preparedness, told ABCNews.com. "The people are very aware of how serious this is."
Aside from a plethora of oil refineries and oil and gas pipelines, Louisiana has two nuclear facilities.
The Waterford Steam Electric Station, Unit 3 nuclear facility, also known as Waterford 3, is a power plant on a 3,000-acre (12-km²) plot in Killona, Louisiana near New Orleans, about 50 miles from the Bayou Corne methane bubbling area.
River Bend Nuclear Generating Station is a nuclear power station on a 3,300-acre (13 km2) site near St. Francisville, Louisiana, about 67 miles from the methane-bubbling sinkhole area.
Both of Louisiana's nuclear power facilities are located in the same aquifer tainted with methane.
20,000 gallons of crude oil removed from surface of giant Louisiana sinkhole — Now averaging 5,000 gallons a day
and...
No Louisiana sinkhole solution
Emergency leaders in Assumption Parish said they saw improvements at the Bayou Corne sinkhole site Friday afternoon in terms of crude-soaked vegetation, but admit there is still no solution or cause of the disaster. . . .
Texas Brine Co. of Houston began on Tuesday removing crude oil trapped in a failed company salt cavern inside the Napoleonville Dome in northern Assumption Parish, company and government officials said.
Texas Brine workers began pumping brine through an observational well that had been drilled recently to find the cause of a 4.2-acre sinkhole nearby. The observational well provides access to the salt cavern the company had been using.
Located between Bayou Corne and Grand Bayou, the sinkhole was found the morning of Aug. 3 south of La. 70 South, leading to a mandatory evacuation of 150 homes. The evacuation order remains in place.
Since oil and water do not mix, the brine is a means of pushing crude oil to the top of the cavern, where it can then be collected and shipped away for reuse or disposal, state and parish officials said.
“Every barrel (of crude) taken out is a barrel (of brine) going in,” said John Boudreaux, director of the Assumption Parish Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness.
Patrick Courreges, Louisiana Department of Natural Resources spokesman, said the replacement brine will be used to maintain stable pressure in the cavern.
Texas Brine is shipping crude removed from the cavern that can be salvaged for reuse to PSC Industrial Outsourcing Inc., Courreges said.
The state Office of Conservation approved the removal plan Tuesday.
Sonny Cranch, Texas Brine spokesman, said brine will be pumped into the well only during daylight hours.
State, parish and company officials said no solid estimates are available on how much oil is in the cavern.
In other developments, Cranch said Texas Brine contractors have largely removed vegetative debris from the surface of the sinkhole and have been vacuuming up crude oil also on the surface for the past two days. Two trees that fell into the south side of the sinkhole overnight Monday have also been removed.
The plan to remove crude oil from the cavern follows the Louisiana Office of Conservation Commissioner Jim Welsh’s order last week saying that the cavern caused the sinkhole.
The order calls on Texas Brine to perform a variety of tests. The company was directed to conduct pressure monitoring on the cavern and set up probes and wells to test and remove natural gas in the aquifer under the area. Part of Welsh’s order also calls on Texas Brine to maintain the stability of the cavern and prevent any more changes.
The Texas Brine cavern is along the western edge of the Napoleonville salt dome, a 1- by 3-mile solid salt deposit used for decades for brine production, hydrocarbon storage and oil-and-gas exploration.
The 449-foot-deep, funnel-shaped sinkhole is not directly over the cavern but about 200 feet northwest. The cavern extends from 3,400 feet to 5,650 feet underground, officials have said.
Scientists think the cavern’s side wall was too close to the edge of the dome and a “side breach” happened on the lower part of the wall, according to Welsh’s order. This “side breach” allowed an estimated 3.3 million cubic yards of material into the cavern, as well as crude oil and gas from natural underground formations next to the dome, the order says.
Courreges said the movement of this material into the cavern released pressure from the tightly compacted underground formations outside the dome, allowing earth to shift and causing the sinkhole.
Oil and gas from those formations also were able to rise to the surface. In addition to crude on the sinkhole’s surface, gas has been found in an underground aquifer in the area and in area waterways.
It is not clear is whether any more oil and gas from the formations outside the dome might continue to enter the cavern once the crude oil is removed by Texas Brine.
Courreges said part of the removal plan involves investigating whether the oil and gas that had moved into the cavern and toward the surface when the cavern failed was a one-time event.
“That is part of what they are trying to figure out,” he said.
“Crosstex Energy to Move Huge Volume of Butane to Another Dome” by Cajun-Pete
“. . . I think it is in the right direction to avert a potentially EXTREMELY serious situation should the sink hole continue to grow, possibly threatening the integrity of this HUGE butane storage dome. What I have feared the most from this mess is the risk of the sink hole damaging the integrity of the nearby huge butane jug. Should that happen, and butane begin to escape to the surface, it would have the potential for a HUGE CATASTROPHIC EVENT! I have worked in the oil and petrochemical industry for over 32 years before retirement.I’ve seen several vapor cloud explosions during my career. The damage such an explosion could create is HUGE. With the volume of butane in this jug, should it begin leaking, it could potentially create a vapor cloud explosion that could affect communities for many, many miles away, and burn uncontrolled for weeks to months before emptying the jug should Crosstex not be able to somehow transfer it elsewhere.”
“On Oct. 10, this author highlighted some public dismay over lack of national news reports on Bayou Corne’s sinkhole disaster, causing the state’s emergency and mandatory evacuation declarations. Some readers’ statements referring to this media near-blackout . . . “
[snip] . . . Scientists think the cavern’s side wall was too close to the edge of the dome and a “side breach” happened on the lower part of the wall, according to Welsh’s order. This “side breach” allowed an estimated 3.3 million cubic yards of material into the cavern, as well as crude oil and gas from natural underground formations next to the dome, the order says.
Courreges said the movement of this material into the cavern released pressure from the tightly compacted underground formations outside the dome, allowing earth to shift and causing the sinkhole.
Oil and gas from those formations also were able to rise to the surface. In addition to crude on the sinkhole’s surface, gas has been found in an underground aquifer in the area and in area waterways.
It is not clear is whether any more oil and gas from the formations outside the dome might continue to enter the cavern once the crude oil is removed by Texas Brine.
We don’t know what to call this event and in ‘tags’ we use NW Louisiana as a common name.This page will carry all the strange speculation on the event. The original news post of Oct. 16 will get added on to with the regular news. And we’ll make an index page for easier navigation to be on the sidebar. This blog is about the Bayou Corne sinkhole … not about every happening in Louisiana. BUT . . . this strange event may later tie into the sinkhole so we’re following it.
