By Erwin Seba
ROBERT, Louisiana (Reuters) - BP Plc engineers using undersea robots manoeuvred a massive metal chamber to within 200 feet (60 metres) of a gushing ruptured oil well in the Gulf of Mexico on Friday, working to contain a leak that threatens an environmental catastrophe on U.S. shores.
The four-story structure, the best short-term hope of controlling the spewing crude, was lowered towards the seabed almost one mile (1.6 km) below the surface in an attempt to funnel the escaping oil to a surface tanker.
BP, which faces enormous financial losses from the spill, suffered a further financial blow when ratings agency Standard & Poor's lowered its outlook on the British oil giant to negative from stable.
Company officials hope that the containment dome will begin funnelling oil from the leak next week. The next three to four days will be spent making the connections to try to pump crude to the surface.
But the devices has never been tried at that depth, where engineers guiding remotely operated vehicles battle darkness, currents and intense undersea pressure. BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward warned there was no certainty of success.
"The pressures and temperatures are very different here, so we cannot be confident that it will work," Hayward told CNN.
The company is drilling a relief well to halt the leak that could take two or three months to complete. Engineers have also considered pumping heavy fluids into the top of the failed blowout preventer to plug the leaking well in a technique called "top kill."
Surface containment efforts continue, helped by calm seas. Controlled burns on Thursday removed up to 9,000 barrels (280,000 gallons/1,070,000 litres) of oil from the water surface, Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer, said in a press briefing.
Burning "is a very powerful technique and when the weather is good it will continue," Suttles said. Forecasts suggest favourable conditions at least through Saturday, with light winds.
About 250 boats deployed protective booms and used dispersants to break up the thick oil on Friday. Almost 800,000 feet (240,000 metres) of boom has been laid so far, along with about 267,000 gallons (1 million litres) of chemical dispersant.
BP has been under heavy pressure from Washington to meet its responsibilities in what could be the largest oil spill in U.S. history. After meeting with BP executives in Houston, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the company and its partners made "some very major mistakes."
Salazar reiterated the U.S. government will issue no new offshore drilling permits until an inter-agency panel gives a safety review to President Barack Obama by May 28. In the meantime, existing drilling will continue.
DOWNGRADE
Standard & Poor's, in announcing the negative outlook, indicated a ratings downgrade was likely. Moody's said the spill raised the spectre of credit pressure for the five primary companies involved in the project.
Besides BP, the companies are Anadarko Petroleum, 25 percent partner in the drilling project; Transocean, owner of the rig that caught fire and collapsed; Cameron International, which supplied the failed blow-out preventer for the well; and Halliburton, which helped cement in place the blown-out well.
Hayward said the company would meet its obligations to contain and clean up the spill, as well as compensate businesses for their resulting losses. He said a $75 million legal cap on its liabilities under federal law, which some U.S. lawmakers want to raise, would not be a limit.
BP shares dropped 2.3 percent in London on Friday, less than the broad STOXX Europe 600 Oil and Gas index which fell 3.8 percent. In New York, trading in BP's American Depository Receipts slipped 3.1 percent.
The spill threatens an economic and ecological disaster on popular tourist beaches, wildlife refuges and fertile fishing grounds in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. It has forced Obama to rethink plans to open more waters to offshore drilling.
At least 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons/795,000 litres) have poured into the Gulf each day since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded two weeks ago, killing 11 workers.
Following the wake-up call from April's deadly events, inspections have been conducted on 30 drilling rigs in the Gulf and found no urgent cause for concern, U.S. officials said.
A sheen of oil has engulfed much of the Chandeleur Islands, barrier islands that are part of Louisiana's Breton National Wildlife Refuge, the first confirmation of the oil slick hitting land. Some oiled birds, including brown pelicans and a gannet, have been found in recent days.
The Breton refuge was closed to the public after a silver sheen and emulsified oil reached the shoreline, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service said. Altogether, crude from the spill could hit 24 national wildlife refuges, the agency said.
A Reuters photographer, on a flyover of the coast, saw a band of oil, orange in colour and about a mile or two in length, running parallel to the shore about 17 miles (27 km) south of barrier islands off Mississippi's mainland near the Alabama border.
Numerous black blobs, possibly emulsified tar, were visible just below the surface in shallow water near some marsh coast to the east of the Chandeleur Islands.
'LAST THING WE NEEDED'
U.S. authorities on Friday modified and expanded the boundaries of the area closed to fishing as a result of the spill, and extended restrictions for another 10 days, to May 17. The closed area represents almost 4.5 percent of Gulf of Mexico federal waters, up from slightly less than 3 percent included in the original ban.
"This oil spill was the last thing we needed," Lance Nacio, a shrimper with Anna Marie Seafood in Dulac, Louisiana, said on a call with reporters. "I think this is going to devastate the industry which was already tattered by low dockside prices."
Kevin Begos, a seafood industry spokesman in Apalachicola, Florida, said seafood dealers in his area have seen orders drop considerably. "Right now, it's mostly fear, because oil hasn't come here yet," Begos said.
Alabama tourism officials planned an ad campaign to let tourists know the beaches were still clean and encourage them not to cancel their vacation plans.
"The beaches are beautiful, the weather is great and the water is clean. The oil is way offshore," Alabama real estate agent Bobby Hornsby said in a message to customers.
Fears of massive shipping problems in the Gulf of Mexico have not panned out. Shippers and ports are prepared to clean vessels that move through the oily waters, but so far ships have passed through without contamination.
"We have seen no impacts at all," said an oil trader for a major refiner that receives oil via the Gulf and Mississippi River."
(Additional reporting by Matt Bigg in Venice, Louisiana; Matt Daily in New York; Tom Bergin in London; Anna Driver, Bruce Nichols and Chris Baltimore in Houston; Tom Brown and Pascal Fletcher in Miami; Karen Brettell in New York; Steve Gorman and Brian Synder in Mobile, Alabama; and Richard Cowan in Washington; writing by John Whitesides and Ros Krasny; editing by Eric Beech)
