Fire on the Horizon: The Untold Story of the Gulf Oil Disaster

by John Konrad, Tom Shroder

Overview

"A phenomenal feat of journalism. . . . I tore through it like a novel but with the queasy knowledge that the whole damn thing is true." —Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm and War

Blending exclusive first-person interviews and penetrating investigative reporting, oil rig captain John Konrad and veteran Washington Post writer Tom Shroder give the definitive, white-knuckled account of the Deepwater Horizon explosion—as well as a riveting insider’s view of the byzantine culture of offshore drilling that made the disaster inevitable. As the world continues to cope with the oil spill’s grim aftermath—with environmental and economic consequences all the more dire in a region still rebuilding from Hurricane Katrina—Konrad and Schroder’s real-time account of the disaster shows us just where things went wrong, and points the way to a safer future for us all.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062066541
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	03/15/2011
Edition description:	Large Print
Pages:	378
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Tom Shroder was an editor and writer at The Washington Post from 1999 to 2009. Under his stewardship, The Washington Post Magazine won the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in both 2008 and 2010. He is the author of the nonfiction bestseller Old Souls. He lives in Vienna, Virginia.

John Konrad is a veteran oil rig captain; a former employee of the Deepwater Horizon's owner, Transocean; and the founder of the world's leading maritime blog, gCaptain.com. A graduate of SUNY Maritime College, he lives in Morro Bay, California.

Table of Contents

Author's Note: A Perilous Crossing ix

Prologue: The End 1

1 The Beginning 3

2 Oil and Water 19

3 Cold Comfort 30

4 Sea Legs 38

5 King Neptune 58

6 Macondo 72

7 X Marks the Spot 92

8 The Flood 120

9 A Captain's Colors 132

10 Latching Up 145

11 Kicks 166

12 A Long String 195

13 Uneasy Partings 214

14 Positive Test 220

15 Negative Test 228

16 Sailor Take Warning 246

17 "Something Ain't Right" 260

18 Mayday 275

19 Abandon Ship 292

20 Mustering 309

21 Going Home 317

Epilogue 333

Acknowledgments 355

What People are Saying About This

Sebastian Junger

“One of the best disaster books I’ve ever read...I tore through it like a novel but with the quesy knowledge that the whole damn thing is true. A phenomenal feat of journalism.”

Editorial Reviews

One of the best disaster books I’ve ever read...I tore through it like a novel but with the quesy knowledge that the whole damn thing is true. A phenomenal feat of journalism.

Sebastian Junger

While the authors do have some pungent criticisms of both BP and Transocean…assigning blame for the massive spill is not the book's top priority. Instead, it focuses on the lives and culture of the individual men and (far fewer) women who sail the giant rigs and tackle the mind-bogglingly complex feat of digging the deepwater wells. The book covers a remarkable amount of territory with brisk efficiency. Konrad and Shroder offer lucid thumbnail descriptions of everything from the history of offshore drilling to the biological and geological forces that create deepwater oil deposits. Their depiction of everyday life aboard rigs like the Horizon…is especially fascinating.
—The Washington Post

Gary Krist

“Harrowing...the best account yet of what went wrong.

Daily Beast

This is a real insider's view of the BP spill. A veteran oil-rig captain, Konrad was a longtime employee of TransOcean, owner of the Deepwater Horizon, and knew many of the crewmembers personally. His one-on-ones with the crew here meld with former Washington Post editor/writer Shroder's reporting. The argument: there's a particular culture on an offshore oil rig that made it inevitable.

Library Journal