Weatherford achieves ultra-deepwater sidetrack milestone

HOUSTON - Weatherford International’s Shallow Angle QuickCut System successfully achieved the industry's first 12 ¼-in. casing sidetrack, delivering a 22-ft. window in a single trip for an ultra-deepwater well in the Gulf of Mexico.

"The operator contacted Weatherford to perform a Gulf of Mexico ultra-deepwater exit in a 12 ¼-in. heavy wall casing," said Chip Miller, Vice President, North America Geozone, Weatherford. "This successful 12 ¼-in. sidetrack casing became an industry first, made even more complicated by the need to achieve a dogleg low enough for production packers to safely pass through the resulting window."

Leveraging its decades-long history of successful exits in heavy-walled casing, Weatherford and the operator deployed the Shallow Angle QuickCut with MultiCatch Anchor and milled the 22-ft casing window and 15-ft rat hole in a single trip.  

"This industry-first serves as a best practice for successfully exiting heavy wall casing, opening up a contingency scenario that was previously not feasible while at the same time, allowing operators to tap into bypassed reservoir sections safely and efficiently," said Miller.