Bloody damnation. This has been spicy.

Had an interesting picture come over my e-mail transom this morning, but first: a pictorial explanation of the most common ways a hydrate plug ruptures a pipeline:



That’s from the 1994 edition of CAPP Guidelines for the Prevention and Safe Handling of Hydrates, Canadian Assn. of Petroleum Producers, in case you were wondering.

Anyhoo, the picture in question is actually a map:



Anyone notice anything interesting about the ruptures at 02:03 hours and 19:03 hours?

Assuming that the map accurately represents the course of the pipelines; and assuming that the map accurately represents the location of the ruptures … wah-ho, isn’t that interesting, as Dear Old Dad would say?

Even more interesting is this little tidbit, also via email. Russia was having compressor “issues” on Nord 1, enough that the whole sodding compressor station was “shut down” and a “hazardous production facility”.

Is anyone else getting the twitchies regarding the fact that at least some of the equipment that keeps the pipeline pressurised was off-line? Just me? Oh, well then. Carry on.

Moving on — multiple sources have confirmed that Nord 2 was full of natural gas; that it was full for at least months; and that said natural gas had never moved.

It. Just. Sat. There. For — allegedly — months.

During normal operations of a pipeline, you run a pig through fairly regularly. A “pig” is a bit of equipment pushed by the gas flow, and as it moves along it shoves water and hydrate slurry down to where it can be removed; and it scrapes compounds off the inside walls (hydrogen sulphide, I’m looking at you) that might be is probably eating your pipe.

Note the part above where the pigs are pushed by the gas. The gas in Nordstream 2 never moved. That means no pig ever went down the line to shove water out, move hydrate slurry, or stop H2S from corroding the steel of the pipeline.

As I said in the previous post — and I will continue to say — none of this rules out intentional Acts of War. There are idiots enough in that region that sabotage can’t be discounted.

How-some-ever … hydrate plugs.

With that being said, this sudden publicity is really freaking me out, so I’m probably going dark for a few days. I’ve got writing to do, fish to catch, and maybe a deer trail or two to scout.

Y’all have fun.

LawDog