Over the years TOTAL E&P Indonesie has experienced several well control situations that were controlled successfully most of the time, but on a few occasions the situation escalated and the well was lost or the rig had to be abandoned. Analyses of these undesired events has highlighted that appropriate handling of these delicate situations was the key factor to regaining control of the well. Development of new in-house well control software and integration of this software with the corporate drilling engineering software has provided an efficient package to mitigate operational and human risks during well control operations. Well data is captured on the rig site on a daily basis and correlated with the predicted values from the corporate drilling engineering software program. Flow rates, bottom hole assembly characteristics, mud properties and well design are entered into the software and matched with the pressure data, including the annular pressure losses and the software provides a spreadsheet for controlling the well should an event occur. When a well control situation occurs, the kick data is entered into the software, which immediately provides guidelines and a pumping schedule on how to regain control of the well. The software features allow the offshore team to focus on operations; reducing human error by avoiding calculations and increasing communication efficiency with all teams involved prior to commencing well control procedures through the use of a printed pumping schedule chart. This newly developed tool has reduced substantially TOTAL E&P Indonesie's kick complications such as losses and multiple circulations, which were common prior to implementation of this powerful tool. It has eased decision processes while handling well control situations.
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