Diamond Offshore Drilling announced a brace of contract wins, including work for Serica in the North Sea and a BP subsidiary in the Gulf of Mexico.
Diamond (NYSE:DO) said on Thursday it had secured a contract for the Ocean Patriot with Serica Energy, which will see its Ocean Patriot deployed for two plug and abandonment (P&A) wells in the UK North Sea.
Worth over $10 million of backlog, excluding mobilisation, the program is estimated to commence in March 2024 and to continue for approximately 60 days.
In addition, Diamond has secured a $350m two-year extension for with a subsidiary of BP in the US Gulf of Mexico.
Covering the Ocean BlackLion, this is set to commence in September 2024 in direct continuation of the rig’s current contract.
The drilling firm’s president and CEO Bernie Wolford, Jr., commented: “These awards reflect the continuing strength of the drillship market and the improving moored floater market in the U.K. North Sea while highlighting the exceptional work of our crews across these regions.”
The Ocean Patriot was on contract at the Apache Beryl area from May 2022, and had been due to carry out work there until August 2024. However, Apache opted to cut the contract for the rig short at the end of that year.
Diamond then landed new work with Repsol Resources UK for another two-well P&A contract which had been due to end in Q4 of last year.
Meanwhile last week brought upset at the Ocean Greatwhite – currently working for BP west of Shetland – when the rig’s lower marine riser package “unintentionally separated” causing it to fall to the seabed at BP’s Schiehallion field.
The incident occurred during a storm on February 1, around 125 miles west of the islands,
It is understood both parties are now investigating the incident.
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