Hallibuton Pleads Guilty To Destroying Simulation Data From 2010 Gulf Oil Spill

An anonymous reader writes "Oilfield services giant Halliburton will plead guilty to destroying computer test results that had been sought as evidence in the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the Justice Department announced Thursday. Company officials threw out test results that showed 'little difference' between the number of devices Halliburton said was needed to center the cement casing in the well at the heart of the disaster and the number well owner BP installed, according to court papers. The issue has been key point of contention between the two companies in hearings and litigation ever since the April 2010 blowout. BP and Halliburton are still battling over responsibility for the disaster in a New Orleans federal courtroom. BP had no comment on the plea agreement Thursday evening."

what don't we know?

[globaljustin]

from TFA:

Halliburton has agreed to pay the maximum fines available, be put on probation for three years and cooperate with federal agencies that are still investigating the spill, the Justice Department said in a statement announcing Thursday's agreement. In addition Halliburton has made a $55 million "voluntary contribution" to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation,

They 'took a deal' in the parlance of the criminal justice world.

I'm wondering what else is out there. Also in TFA I read that BP was 'convicted' of Manslaughter for its role.

These companies don't 'take deals' unless it is the absolute last option. They will deny and tie up litigation for 10 years until everyone forgets. They will buy judges and prosecutors. They will hire thugs to find dirt on opponents, or make dirt if none exists.

Given their history, the fact that Halliburton, BP, etc took these deals indicates they could be covering for a much larger level of negligence...

In my wildest conspiracy theories, the English Monarchy and other old money global illuminati types (Bush's?) purposefully had the well blown to punish America for stopping Keystone XL.

Re:All simulations lie

[hey!]

Well, I don't know about engineering simulations, but I've worked with systems that did public health simulations. What laymen *think* a computer model can do is predict the future. And maybe in some cases a model can come close to doing that. But the real value of models is to generate questions and hypotheses for investigation.

The problem with models is that they're only as good as the input data you feed them, and in many cases the data is unknowable or based on assumptions you aren't sure of. And that leads to a practical application of a model. You don't say, "I know that X is true, therefore Y will or will not happen" because you almost certainly don't know everything you'd need to know to make such a positive prediction. Rather, you say, "If you are worried about Y, you'd better check on X."

Tthat Halliburton destroyed the documentation when it knew that documentation was needed for the DWH investigation makes me wonder whether simulation results suggested Transocean (the operators of DWH) ought to be paying attention to certain preventable factors that contributed to the disaster. Even if that didn't let Transocean off the hook, it might change the distribution of damages and fines paid by the responsible parties.