An oil well leaking natural gas on Alaska's North Slope was successfully plugged by pumping saltwater into the well, according to private and government responders.

The state Department on Environmental Conservation on Monday said the well operated by BP Exploration Alaska Inc., a subsidiary of BP, was "killed" at 3:35 a.m.

The well is five miles from the airport at Deadhorse. Employees on Friday morning discovered uncontrolled natural gas flowing from the top of a well house, a metal structure that looks like a large box over a well.

About 45 minutes later, they determined that the well was spraying a mist of crude oil into the air.

BP reported the leak and set up a joint response team with state, federal and municipal responders.

A weekend statement from the "unified command" said two leaks were detected. Oil was spraying from a leak near the top of the well. Workers contained that leak by activating a safety valve.

Oil droplets likely were contained to 1.5 acres (0.61 hectares) of the drill pad, responders said. They were waiting for the well to be plugged to determine if oil reached nearby snow-covered tundra.

Responders determined the well had risen up to 4 feet (1.22 meters) causing a pressure gauge to break off and preventing responders from pumping material into the well to kill it.

Responders on Saturday night were able to enter the well house and connect hoses to valves. That allowed the bleeding off of gas from space around the well's below-ground piping and a reduction in gas pressure.

Responders from Boot and Coots Services, a well-control contractor, entered the well house and placed a plug in the above-ground piping. That allowed responders to pump in a solution of methanol and saltwater, killing the well.

The temperature at the site Monday was 21 degrees F (-6.11 Celsius).

The nearest village, Nuiqsut (noo-IK-sit), is 50 miles (80.46 kilometers) away.

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An earlier version of this story listed an incorrect name for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. The story also incorrectly said federal and state workers, not oil field workers, reduced pressure in the oil well.</s>Anchorage - A federal official says crews in Alaska are trying to shut down an oil well that is leaking explosive natural gas on the frozen North Slope.

The Environmental Protection Agency says a crack in a BP wellhead near Deadhorse sent up a mist of crude oil on Friday before it froze over and an initial leak stopped.

However, agency spokesperson Suzanne Skadowski says a second crack was discovered that's releasing flammable, explosive gas.

It's unclear how much has vented, but nearby workers have been evacuated and native Alaskan villages dozens of kilometres away have been notified.

The agency says the initial oil release may have affected an area of about one hectare and there were no reports of damage to wildlife.

Skadowski says the EPA, state and BP hope to shut down the well later on Saturday.</s>A federal official says crews in Alaska are trying to shut down an oil well that is leaking explosive natural gas on the frozen North Slope. The Environmental Protection Agency says a crack in a BP wellhead near Deadhorse sent up mist of crude oil Friday before it froze over and an initial leak stopped.

Start the conversation, or Read more at KWWL-TV Waterloo.</s>Oil well leaking out of control on Arctic Alaska North Slope

A BP oil and gas production well in Alaska’s North Slope blew out Friday morning, and on Saturday afternoon, the well was still not under control as responders fought subfreezing temperatures and winds gusting up to 38 mph.

Efforts to get the well under control were also being hampered by damage to a well pressure gauge and by indications that the well itself has “jacked up,” or risen three to four feet, the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation said in a situation report Saturday afternoon.

BP, whose Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico blew out and caused the largest oil spill in U.S. history, has responded to questions about the well, but information was limited and there was no estimate about volumes of natural gas and oil released.

The well was venting natural gas and sending a “spray” of crude oil into the air Saturday. BP has reported to regulators that the crude spray has landed on the drilling pad but it remains unsafe to approach the well and determine whether the crude spray has affected tundra in the area. An overflight with infrared capabilities indicated that the spray plume did not spread beyond the drilling pad, according to the Alaska DEC.

The ADEC also said that two leaks have been identified at the well, one near the top and one further down the well assembly.

“The top leak was misting oil in conjunction with releasing natural gas,” the department said, but “the activation of the surface safety valve has stopped the release from that point. The bottom leak has been reduced, but is currently leaking gas as well as some minor amount of crude oil.”

“BP is in the process of shutting in a well at the Prudhoe Bay oil field that experienced an unplanned release of hydrocarbon,” said Brett Clanton, a BP spokesman in Houston.

“No people were in the vicinity of the well at the time of the release and there are no injuries,” he added. “Crews have secured the site, the fire department is on the scene and crew members are now working to safely shut in the well. All necessary notifications have been made to state and federal regulators.”

The well is about five miles from the airport at Deadhorse, a remote town in northern Alaska that has been the service center for tapping the Prudhoe Bay oil field, the largest ever discovered in the United States. Production began there 40 years ago.

In general, oil companies have been producing oil and pumping associated natural gas back into reservoirs. That helps enhance oil recovery but it is also because there is no pipeline to carry natural gas to markets.</s>A federal official said crews in Alaska are trying to shut down an oil well that is leaking explosive natural gas on the frozen North Slope.

The Environmental Protection Agency said a crack in a BP wellhead near Deadhorse sent up mist of crude oil on Friday before it froze over and an initial leak stopped.

BP spokesman Brett Clanton said that “based on an overflight with infrared cameras, the release appears to be contained to the gravel pad surrounding the wellhead and has not reached the tundra.”

Clanton said BP is focused on safely securing the well.

However, agency spokeswoman Suzanne Skadowski said a second crack was discovered that’s releasing flammable, explosive gas.

It’s unclear how much has vented, but nearby workers have been evacuated and native Alaskan villages dozens of miles away have been notified.

No injuries have been reported.

There were no reports of damage to wildlife.

The agency said the initial oil release may have affected an area of about one-and-a-half acres.

Skadowski said the EPA, state and BP hoped to shut down the well on Saturday.</s>An oil well leaking natural gas on Alaska’s North Slope has been successfully plugged, according to private and government responders.

BP Exploration Alaska Inc. confirmed Monday that its well five miles from the airport at Deadhorse was successfully “killed” overnight. The method of plugging the well was not immediately announced.

BP Exploration Alaska is a subsidiary of BP. Employees on Friday morning discovered uncontrolled natural gas flowing from the top of a well house, a metal structure that looks like a large box over a well.

About 45 minutes later, they determined that the well was spraying a mist of crude oil into the air.

BP reported the leak and set up a joint response team with state, federal and municipal responders.

A weekend statement from the “unified command” said two leaks were detected. Oil was spraying from a leak near the top of the well. Workers contained that leak by activating a safety valve.

Oil droplets were confirmed on about 1.5 acres of the drill pad, responders said. They were waiting for the well to be plugged to determine if oil reached nearby snow-covered tundra.

Responders determined the well had risen 3 to 4 feet, causing a pressure gauge to break off and preventing responders from pumping material into the well to kill it.

Responders on Saturday night were able to enter the well house and connect hoses to valves. That allowed the bleeding off of gas from space around the well’s below-ground piping and a reduction in gas pressure.

The nearest village, Nuiqsut (noo-IK-sit), is 50 miles away.</s>BP announced today that a leak from one of its North Slope production wells was stopped at 3:35 am Monday.

State regulators don’t yet have an estimate for how much oil and gas was released from the well. The cause of the incident is still unknown.

The well was spewing both gas and crude oil when BP first noticed the leak on Friday morning. State and federal regulators reported the well stopped spraying oil on Saturday after a safety valve was activated.

The well continued venting natural gas until it was killed Monday morning by pumping salt water down the hole. BP is currently maintaining the water pressure until it can use a mechanical plug to secure the well. It’s not yet known when that plug can be installed.

The initial response took place during challenging weather conditions, according to Suzanne Skadowski, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s public information officer for the incident.

“It has continued to be very cold, and there have been pretty significant winds. Twenty to 30 miles per hour, upwards of 40 and 50 miles an hour,” said Skadowski.

But Skadowski said the main challenge was the well itself. Two separate leaks had formed and the well had risen three to four feet out of the ground. This caused a pressure gauge to break off, which hindered efforts to kill the well.

BP employees were forced to leave the pad during the incident and no injuries were reported.

Regulators are investigating the leak’s impact on the environment, but an initial overflight indicated the crude spray didn’t reach the nearby tundra.

Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Chair Cathy Foerster said her agency will observe the leak investigation, but there’s not yet any evidence that BP did something wrong.

“We have no reason to believe that BP did anything that was regulatorily non-compliant. We have no reason to believe that human error was involved. We just don’t know,” said Foerster.

Foerster said at the time of the incident, the well was producing about 300 barrels of oil and 30 million cubic feet of gas per day.

The well is located about five miles from the Deadhorse airport, and the nearest community, Nuiqsut, is approximately 50 miles west of the pad.

This post has been updated to reflect the fact that the oil release was halted Saturday.</s>ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A federal official says crews in Alaska are ready to shut down an oil well that is misting natural gas on the frozen North Slope, but officials say it's too unstable for responders to get close.

The Environmental Protection Agency says a crack in a BP wellhead near Deadhorse sent up mist of crude oil Friday before it froze over and an initial leak stopped.

"Based on an overflight with infrared cameras, the release appears to be contained to the gravel pad surrounding the wellhead and has not reached the tundra," BP spokesman Brett Clanton said Saturday.

A response team made up of state and federal energy officials and BP personnel was not able to secure the well Friday night or Saturday due to safety concerns.

Two leaks have been identified on the well, one near the top and one further down the well assembly, BP said. The upper leak was misting oil in conjunction with leaking natural gas, but activation of a surface safety valve stopped the release.

The bottom leak was releasing gas and a small amount of crude oil, the energy giant said.

It's unclear how much has vented, but nearby workers have been evacuated and native Alaskan villages dozens of miles away have been notified.

No injuries have been reported.

The agency says the initial oil release may have affected an area of about 1 ½ acres. There were no reports of damage to wildlife.</s>An investigation has been launched into a leak at a BP oil and gas well in Alaska.

The well in the remote North Slope started spewing oil and methane gas on Friday morning.

Workers struggled to get it under control in winds of up to 40mph but finally plugged the leak on Sunday night.

BP said the impact appeared to be limited to the 1.5 acres immediately around the well and that there were no reports of injuries or damage to wildlife.

Lois Epstein, Arctic programme director for The Wilderness Society, an environmental group in Anchorage, Alaska, told Bloomberg: 'This really needs to be thoroughly investigated to find out what went wrong and whether there's a danger of it happening again.'

A BP spokesman said: 'Clean-up and remediation work will be completed once the well is secured.'

Alaska's Department of Environmental Conservation is investigating the cause of the leak with BP and the Alaska Oil And Gas Conservation Commission.</s>HOUSTON (Reuters) - BP Plc said workers on Alaska's North Slope had brought under control a company-operated well that spewed oil and gas over the weekend.

The leak was discovered on Friday and a team from BP, the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and local government was brought in to coordinate efforts. The team halted the well leaks overnight, BP said in a statement on Monday.

The volume of the leak was not disclosed.

A BP spokesman said details of what caused the loss of control were not available. The oil producer had retained Halliburton Co's well control specialists to kill the well, the spokesman said.

ADEC earlier said in a statement that well pipe had temporarily "jacked up" or risen vertically about 3 feet to 4 feet, causing a pressure gauge to break off.

BP has dealt with several spills and leaks in Alaska in the past. In 2006, a corroded pipeline released nearly 5,000 barrels of crude oil, the largest oil spill in the North Slope at the time. Another spill occurred in 2009 that saw just over 1,000 barrels leak.

In 2010, a BP-operated drilling rig called Deepwater Horizon exploded, killing 11 people and spilling nearly 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, making it the largest oil spill in U.S. federal waters. BP eventually agreed to pay $18.7 billion to settle all federal and state claims related to the spill.
A BP Alaskan North Slope oil well near Deadhorse Airport, that was leaking oil and natural gas since it was discovered on Friday, is successfully plugged, according to private and government reports.