Shut-in procedures while wireline logging operation are very critical for all drillling crew working on the rig. Learn about two vital cases of the shut-in procedures.

Two cases of shut the well in while logging with wire line are as follows;

1. Shut the well in while wireline logging through open BOP without a lubricator.

2. Shut the well in while wireline logging through open BOP with a lubricator installed in the BOP.

Let’s talk about the first case: Shut the well in while wireline logging through open BOP without a lubricator.

First step: Stop logging operation

Second step: Shut the well in by following these procedures;

1. Close annular preventor because we would like to use the annular preventor element to squeeze around the wireline. You may need to increase closing pressure in order to have affective sealing ability if necessary.

2. Open a HCR valve against a fully closed choke manifold valve.

3. Use a trip tank to confirm that flow is stopped and the well is totally shut-in.

4. Inform drilling supervisors

The well sometimes cannot be totally shut in via a closed annular preventor therefore you must consider cutting the wireline and letting it drop then using blind rams to shut the well in instead. If the annular preventor could not seal around the wireline effectively and the wireline cannot be cut and dropped through the Blow Out Preventor (BOP), you may consider using shear rams to cut the wire as the last option.

Let’s talk about the second case: Shut the well in while wireline logging through open BOP with a lubricator installed in the BOP.

First step: Stop logging operation

Second step: Shut the well in by following these procedures;

1. Energize pack off seals at the lubricator. You may need to increase closing pressure in order to have affective sealing ability if necessary.

2. Open a HCR valve against a fully closed choke manifold valve.

3. Use a trip tank to confirm that flow is totally stopped and the well is properly shut-in.

4. Inform drilling supervisors

Ref books: Well Control Books

After you complete shut in procedure while tripping, there is following information that must be recorded before making any decision on how to kill the well.

Shut-In Casing Pressure (SICP): Read and record the shut-in casing pressure (casing gauge).

In order to get the proper pressure reading, the casing gauge should be installed upstream of the closed choke.

Pit Gain: Read and record the pit gain. Pit volume gained is very critical for the maximum casing pressure calculation.

Practically, while tripping out of hole, a trip tank is used to track displace volume in use. The accurate pit gain value can be easily figure out by finding difference between actual volume taken to fill up wellbore and theoretical fill up volume. However, if the active pits are used to record the displacement volume, it will be very difficult to figure out the accurate pit gain. The concept of determining the pit gain is the same as using the trip tank. However, the reason that I say that it is very difficult to get the accurate pit gain because pit volume is too large to record few changes while tripping.

Time: Record the time that the well control situation is occurred and keep an accurate time log for the entire well kill operation

Bit Depth: Record bit depth.

Ref books: Well Control Books

Tripping out of the hole is a critical operation, which drilling team must keep close eye on well control situation that can occur anytime. Wellbore monitoring and hole filling equipment and must be working properly so that the kick can be quickly detected. You must be aware of and prepared for the well control situation every tripping operation.

While tripping, it can cause swabbing effect that may allow formation fluid entering into wellbore. The well may not start to flow since the swabbing effect is just started. The swabbing effect will result in reducing the overall hydrostatic pressure. If the well is continually swabbed-in until the hydrostatic pressure in the wellbore less than formation pressure, the well will start flowing. Any time that you see short fill while tripping out, you need to go back to bottom and circulate bottom up to confirm wellbore condition.

When the well control situation is happened during tripping operation, the drilling crew must shut the well in right away using the following “3 S” shut-in procedures.

Stab Valve: Install Full-Open Safety Valve (FOSV) that must be in an open position in drill string. Make up to drilling string and close the safety valve.

Space Out: Space out to ensure that tool joint must no locate in BOP element.

Shut-in well: Close the annular preventer or uppermost pipe rams. Open the upper choke line valve against a fully closed manifold valve at a choke manifold. Line up to trip tank to confirm that the well is shut-in and flow has been stopped.

Ref books: Well Control Books

There are several figures that must be recorded after the well has been properly shut in in case of a well control situation.

Shut-In Casing Pressure (SICP): Read and record the shut-in casing pressure (casing gauge).

In order to get the proper pressure reading, the casing gauge should be installed upstream of the closed choke.

Shut-In Drillpipe Pressure (SIDP): Read and record the shut-in drillpipe pressure. You must remember that whether you have a float in drilling string or not.

If there is no a float is in the drillstring, the shut in drill pipe pressure can be read directly from the standpipe manifold.

If there is a float in the drillstring, you need to bump the float in order to determine the correct shut in drill pipe pressure. I will write about how to bump float to record the shut in drill pipe pressure later.

Time: Record the time that the well control situation is occurred and keep an accurate time log for the entire well kill operation

Closing Pressure: Record the closing pressure of BOP. In order to prevent well bore fluid leaking through BOP elements, the closing pressure should be high enough.

Pit Gain: Read and record the pit gain. Pit volume gained is very critical for the maximum casing pressure calculation. You should check the volume gained from mud logger and driller in order to get the accurate figure. I don’t recommend you to ask only one person to get this figure. It is better to have another data source to compare with.

After the well is properly secured and all information is gathered, the supervisor on the rig should inform his supervisor to find the proper method to kill the well.

Ref books: Well Control Books

I created summary page for drilling formulas and calculations (http://www.drillingformulas.com/drilling-formulas-and-calculation-sheets/). I wish these excel sheets would be helpful for you.

Amount of cuttings produced per foot of hole drilled
Annular Pressure Loss
Annular-Capacity
Annular-velocity
Bulk Density Calculation
Buoyancy Factor Oilfield
Convert Pressure to Equivalent Mud Weight
Convert-Specific-Gravity
Cost Per Foot Calculation
Critical RPM
D Exponent Calculation
D Exponent Corrected Calculation
Decrease Oil Water Ratio
Density of Oil Water Mixture
Depth of Washout
Dilution LGS control
Dilution LGS control – adding mud
Directional Survey Calculation – Angle Averaging Method
Directional Survey Calculation – Radius of Curvature Method
Dogleg Severity Calculation – Radius of Curvature Method
Dogleg Severity Calculation – Tangential Method
Drilling or Connection Ton-Mile
Drill-pipe-pulled-to-lose-certain-hydrostatic-pressure
Equivalent Circulating Density Calculation
Equivalent Circulating Density with engineering formula
Formation Integrity Test
Formation Temperature
Free Point Constant Calculation
Hydraulic Horse Power
Hydrostatic Pressure Calculation
Hydrostatic Pressure Decreases When POOH
Increase mud weight adding Barite
Increase mud weight adding calcium carbonate
Increase mud weight adding hematite
Increase Oil Water Ratio
Internal Capacity
Lag Time Calculation
Leak off test calculation
Light Weight Spot Pill
Loss hydrostatic due to filling water into annulus
Mix Different Fluid Density – Limit Space
Mix Different Fluid Density – Unlimit Space
Mud Volume Increase Due to Adding Barite
Mud Volume Increase Due to Adding Calcium Carbonate
Mud Volume Increase Due to Adding Hematite
Oil Water Ratio from a Retort Analysis
Pipe Displacement Calculation
Pressure and Force Calculation
Pressure Gradient Calculation
Pressure Required to Break Circulation In Annulus
Pressure Required to Break Circulation Inside Drill String
Pump Output (Duplex and Triplex)
Pump Pressure and Pump Stroke Relationship
Reduce Mud Weight by Dilution
Slug Calculation – Barrel of Slug Required
Slug Calculation – barrels of slug required for a desired length of dry pipe
Slug Calculation – Weight of Slug Required
Specific Gravity Calculation
Starting Volume for Weighting Up with Bartie
Starting Volume for Weighting Up with calcium carbonate
Starting Volume for Weighting Up with Hematite
Stuck Pipe Calculation – Not Know Free Point Constant
Stuck Pipe Calculation – Use Table for Free Point Constant
Temperature Conversion Formulas
Ton-Mile (TM) for Coring Operation
Ton-Mile (TM) for Making Short Trip
Ton-Mile (TM) for Round Trip
Ton-Mile (TM) for Setting Casing
Ton-Mile (TM) for Drilling or Connection

Ref book: Formulas and Calculations for Drilling, Production and Workover, Second Edition

While drilling, drilling team must be carefully check for well control indicators and if the positive kick indicator(s) indicated, crew must instantly know how to shut in the well in correct manner. The steps below, called “3S” shut-in procedures, demonstrate how to properly shut the well in while drilling.

Drilling shut in procedures (3S) – HARD SHUT IN PROCEDURE-

1. Space Out – Stop drilling, pick up drilling sting off bottom and space out to ensure that tool joint is not located at BOP element that we would like to shut the well in.

2. Stop Down – Stop mud pumps

3. Shut In - Close an annular preventer or an uppermost pipe rams. Use trip tank to verify that the flow is stopped and the well is completely shut in. Then inform supervisors as drilling representative, tool pusher, OIM.

Ref book: Well Control Book

For the drilling industry especially when we talk about well control, there are 2 types of shut in which are Hard Shut-in and Soft Shut-in.  This post will describe both shut in types and I wish I would be helpful for you all

Hard shut in: It means that while drilling choke line valves (HCR) are in the closed position; it will be opened after the well is shut in. The hard shut-in is the fastest method to shut in the well; therefore, it will minimize volume of kick allowed into wellbore.

Soft Shut In: It means that while drilling, the choke line valves (HCR) are in the opened position. When the well control situation is occurred, you shut in BOP and then close choke valves to shut in the well. The soft shut in procedure allows fluid to flow through the surface choke line before the well will be completely shut in. This is the bad part of the soft shut in procedure because it doesn’t minimize the size of the wellbore influx.

The shut in procedure is the company specific procedure. You need to follow your company policy to shut in the well. Anyway, I personally recommend “HARD SHUT IN PROCEDURE” because it allows me to shut well in as quickly as possible and kick volume entering into a well bore will be minimized. Please also remember that less volume of kick you have in the well bore, the less problem you will see when you attempt to kill the well.

Ref book: Well Control Book

With static wellbore condition, any gas entering into mud while tripping is called “Trip Gas”. Gas will be seen while circulating bottom up after tripping back in hole again. Trip gas is caused by swabbing effect while tripping out of hole.

If you see a lot of trip gas after circulating out, this situation indicates that the wellbore is almost in a balance condition.

“Connection Gas” is distinct increase of gas above a normal background gas level when bottom up occurs after a connection. If you see a small high gas peak in short period of time and when you calculate back you will see that it comes from every connection, you can suspect that this is the Connection Gas.

The connection gas occurs because total pressure (hydrostatic pressure + friction pressure) temporarily decreases during making connection. Basically, it means that you lose equivalent circulating density due to pumps off. In addition, the connection could be happened because of swabbing effect when the drill string is worked off bottom prior to making connection.

The connection gas can indicate that pressure between hydrostatic pressure exerted by drilling fluid and formation pressure is almost in balance condition. Therefore, when you see the connection gas, you should consider weighting up mud in the system before resuming drilling operation or tripping operation.

Ref book: Well Control Book

You may sometimes are in a bad situation with stuck pipe. You may possibly try several method to free the pipe but NO SUCCESS.

This is another method that you may consider using that as well. Let’s try!!!

Have a nice and lovely day my friends.