Pride International News

Offshore vessel owner Tidewater on Tuesday announced the appointment of Melissa Cougle to its Board of Directors, effective immediately. Cougle most recently served as Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Frank’s International until November 2021. She previously served as Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of National Energy Services Reunited. Cougle began her career with Arthur Andersen in 1999 and subsequently held positions of increasing responsibility in the oilfield services industry at Ensco plc, and prior to that Pride International. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Business from Louisiana State University and is a Certified Public Accountant."Melissa is a seasoned executive with a strong track record of leadership in the oil and gas sector…

A Valaris drillship went adrift on Tuesday evening, breaking free from moorings near the port at Hunterston, North Ayrshire, Scotland.According to BBC, which was the first to report on the incident on Wednesday, "a major rescue operation has been ongoing overnight," when the 228 meters drillship, Valaris DS4, broke free and started drifting without power.According to the news agency, coastguard rescue teams, vessels, and a helicopter were dispatched to the scene, and no injuries have been reported.Offshore Engineer has reached out to Valaris and Maritime and Coastguard Agency, seeking more info. Valaris did not immediately respond. A…

South Korean shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries Co. (SHI) has agreed to pay $75 million in penalties to avoid prosecution in the United States over its scheme to pay millions of dollars in bribes to Brazilian officials to win a contract.“Samsung Heavy Industries paid millions of dollars to a Brazilian intermediary, knowing that some of that money would be used to bribe high-level executives at Petrobras and obtain a lucrative shipbuilding contract,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “Today’s resolution is yet one more example of the Department’s continued commitment…

Brazilian prosecutors plan to file criminal charges stemming from the lease of an Ensco Plc offshore oil-drilling ship to Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras "in due course," they said. The plan to prosecute over the Ensco-Petrobras charter was mentioned in a Thursday statement presenting corruption charges stemming from the 2009 lease of another drillship, Vantage Drilling's Titanium Explorer Rig. In the Vantage case, prosecutors formally charged six people, including Petrobras' former international-unit chief Jorge Zelada. Petroleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, chartered the DS-5 in 2008, when it was owned by Pride International, a company London-based Ensco purchased in 2011.

The Kingdom of Bahrain’s Arab Shipbuilding & Repair Yard Co (ASRY) has turned in a profitable first quarter of 2012 despite the continued shipping recession and increased competition in the region. As of the beginning of May ASRY was running at close to capacity and had work in hand for the next 12 weeks. This, says CEO Chris Potter, is quite some achievement in a region which already has plenty of repair capacity, even before two major new repair facilities opened for business recently in Qatar and Oman.

Pride International, Inc. (NYSE: PDE) announced that the company has reached agreement with Samsung Heavy Industries, Ltd. (SHI) for the construction of a fifth ultra-deepwater drillship, further expanding the company's ultra-deepwater fleet size and drilling capabilities. Consistent with the company's previous four ultra-deepwater drillships ordered since 2007, the new unit will be constructed on a fixed price basis at the SHI shipyard in Geoje, South Korea, with an expected delivery in mid-2013. The rig will be equipped with some of the most technically advanced well construction features available in the offshore drilling industry…

Pride International recently dedicated its ABS-classed deepwater drillship Deep Ocean Clarion at Samsung Heavy Industries Shipyard in Geoje, South Korea. This is the second of four new drillships for the deepwater drilling contractor. Its sister ship, the ABS-classed Deep Ocean Ascension was delivered in February 2010 and has been deployed to the Gulf of Mexico. The 96,000 dwt Deep Ocean Clarion is capable of dual drilling activity and can drill in water depths of up to 12,000 feet.

Pride International, Inc. (NYSE: PDE) announced the dedication of the second of its four new deepwater drillships under construction by Samsung Heavy Industries in South Korea, the Deep Ocean Clarion. The company is expected to take delivery of the rig in September 2010, followed by the mobilization of the rig to the U.S. Gulf of Mexico where it is expected to commence operations in the first quarter of 2011 under a five year contract with BP. In a shipyard ceremony, Louis A. Raspino, President and Chief Executive Officer of Pride International, Inc., commented, "The addition of the Deep Ocean Clarion to our fleet further strengthens Pride's presence in the deepwater. These drillships represent the best, most technologically advanced generation of rigs.

At the recent ABS Council meeting in N.Y., 40 prominent members of the shipping and offshore industries were elected as new members of the international classification society. The ABS Council also elected two new members to the society’s Technical Committee. “ABS governance is vested in a membership comprised of distinguished individuals drawn from the international shipping, shipbuilding and offshore industries, from academia, the insurance sector and other related disciplines,” said ABS Chairman and CEO Robert D. Somerville. Akimitsu Ashida, President, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. Noel L. Captain Ali M. Belhag, Chairman, GNMTC – General National Maritime Transport Co. Joseph L. Takatoshi Funada, President, Funada Kaiun Co., Ltd. Kevin M.

Pride International, Inc. (NYSE: PDE) reported income from continuing operations for the three months ended June 30, 2009 of $121.8 million, or $0.69 per diluted share. The second quarter results compared to income from continuing operations of $153.1 million, or $0.87 per diluted share, for the corresponding three months in 2008. Results for the second quarter of 2008 included a net after-tax gain of $11.8 million, or $0.07 per diluted share, relating primarily to the sale of the company's platform rig fleet. Revenues during the second quarter of 2009 totaled $500.7 million compared to $541.5 million during the second quarter of 2008. Louis A.

Forecasts say that Tropical Storm Gustav could regain hurricane strength and affect major offshore oil and natural gas production areas in the Gulf of Mexico also portend a significant threat to onshore energy sites, the Houston Chronicle reported. As they prepare for a possible hit from Gustav, operators of such facilities hope improvements they made in rebuilding after the 2005 storms will improve their odds of weathering the next one. Oil futures rose $1.87 to $118.14 a barrel Wednesday on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Natural gas increased 20.7 cents to $8.485 per million British thermal units. In preparation for the storm, offshore drillers began securing wells, pulling up equipment and bringing workers ashore on Wednesday.

Pride International is continuing the expansion of its deepwater fleet, following a multi-year contract award from a subsidiary of Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) for the construction and operation of an advanced-capability, ultra-deepwater drillship in support of Petrobras's international exploration and development drilling projects. The ultra-deepwater drillship, to be built at the Samsung Heavy Industries, Co. Ltd. (SHI) shipyard in Geoje, South Korea on a fixed-price basis…

Pride International awarded Signal International LLC a contract to outfit and integrate the drilling equipment for BP's Mad Dog truss spar production facility in Green Canyon Block 782. The drilling support module (DSM) for Mad Dog arrived at Signal's Port Arthur, Texas, facility on Feb. 1. The derrick equipment set will be mated to the DSM following its scheduled mid-March arrival at the facility. The unit will then be integrated and commissioned with final load-out and redelivery anticipated in mid-May. Pride is operator of the drilling rig. J. Ray McDermott is constructing the 16-slot truss spar, which will include the rig, production equipment and permanent quarters for drilling and production personnel.

Coastal Petroleum Company said Florida's First District Court of Appeal denied motions by the State and certain environmental groups asking for a rehearing of the Court's decision of Oct. 6, 1999. The Court also affirmed that the Florida circuit court was the proper venue to determine the issue of the State's taking of Coastal's property. In its October decision, the Court said, "There is no dispute that (Coastal) has a viable contract with the State of Florida to explore for and extract oil from submerged sovereignty lands. DEP's interpretation and application of the permitting statute, based on its determination that there is a compelling public purpose in not allowing (Coastal) to drill offshore, effectively prevents the appellant from exercising its rights under the contract.

First Wave/Newpark Shipbuilding has entered into agreements with Pride International for refurbishments of four offshore rigs including the addition of a twenty-eight man quarters module to one of the rigs. Refurbishments to the Pride South Carolina, Pride Mississippi, Pride Oklahoma and Pride Wisconsin will be performed at First Wave's Pelican Island Facility in Galveston, Texas; all rigs are expected to depart the shipyard by mid-August.

Keppel AmFELS has received a fifth order from Scorpion Offshore (Scorpion) for a jackup rig valued at $143 million. This contract is signed with Scorpion’s wholly-owned subsidiary, Scorpion Intrepid Ltd. All five jackup orders have been secured within nine months of Scorpion’s execution of the first construction contract in May 2005. Like Scorpion's other four jackups, the new rig will be a LeTourneau Super 116 design equipped with leg lengths of 477ft, and capable of drilling wells up to 30,000ft deep in water depths of 350ft. Scorpion’s latest rig is named Offshore Intrepid and is scheduled for delivery in the fourth quarter of 2008. The yard is also building two accommodation platforms for PEMEX and a sludge vessel for the City of New York.

As Intelligent Engineering (IE) prepares to carry out another drilling rig repair using its SPS Overlay technology in the reinstatement of the pipe-rack deck on board the Pride South Atlantic, a semi-submersible unit belonging to Pride International, the company's recent focus on the offshore sector is clearly paying dividends. Work on board the Pride South Atlantic, commencing in early July, is the latest in a series of new offshore contracts and will involve the reinstatement of a 490 sq. m. deck area to be carried out at the Maua Jurong facility in Niteroi, close to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. Denis Welch. "One, a significant percentage of the world's mobile offshore drilling units (MODUs) are 20 years old or more and require steel upgrades and reinstatements.

Transocean Inc. announced that a license agreement has been executed by wholly owned subsidiaries of Transocean and Pride International, Inc. (NYSE:PDE). In the agreement, the Transocean subsidiary granted the Pride subsidiary a worldwide and non-exclusive license to utilize Transocean's patents for offshore dual activity drilling methods and structures. In return, the Pride subsidiary agreed to pay the Transocean subsidiary $10 million for the first dual activity rig that Pride builds in a patented country, plus a five percent royalty on dayrate revenue generated by that rig in any patented country. The Pride subsidiary agreed to pay the Transocean subsidiary an additional $15 million for each subsequent dual activity rig that Pride builds in any patented country…

Pride International, Inc. (NYSE:PDE) announced the appointment of Robert G. Phillips to the company's board of directors. Over the past 26 years, Mr. Phillips has served in numerous senior management positions in the oil and gas industry, most recently until June 2007 as president and chief executive officer and a director of the general partner of Enterprise Oil Products Partners L.P. (Enterprise). Mr. Phillips also served as chief executive officer of the general partner of GulfTerra Energy Partners, L.P. from 1999 to 2004 prior to its acquisition by Enterprise, and held numerous management positions with El Paso Corporation and its affiliated companies, including president of El Paso Field Services Company from 1996 to 2004. From 1981 to 1995, Mr.