Arctic Challenger

Arctic Challenger is a barge being converted by Superior Energy Services designed to function as a novel engineering solution which they call an Arctic Containment System to respond should an event occur at drilling sites in the Beaufort or Chukchi Seas where Shell Oil Company is hoping to receive permission to begin drilling in 2013 from US Government agencies.. Greenberry Industrial has been contracted to provide fabricating and construction services at the Port of Bellingham in Washington state. Shell Oil Company intends Arctic Challenger and it's onboard systems to serve as their "fourth line of defense" against a blow out in their drilling operations in the Arctic that could result in a seafloor oil gusher.

The first line of defense is pouring drilling mud down a well. The second line is activating a blow-out preventer, in the Arctic this involves a double shear ram for redundancy. Shell Oil Company has stated via their spokesperson Kelly op de Weegh “We are committed to having the Arctic containment system in place before drilling through liquid hydrocarbon zones, and that commitment will not change. We are nearing completion of this first-of-its-kind Arctic containment system, which houses response, containment and separation processes in one vessel. While it’s a fourth line of defense in the unlikely event of a loss of well control, it will not be deployed until it meets our high standards.”

A major component of the project is the containment dome which is designed to be lowered over the blowout to vacuum up the spewing crude oil and natural gas and to deliver those products to the equipment on the ship for separation and processing to ameliorate the damage otherwise expected from a submarine blowout resulting from a drilling catastrophe such as occurred with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and other offshore blowouts.

The initial iteration of the containment dome had no markings on the structure to indicate which of 4 sides the Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) was viewing nor which of 8 winches were needed to be activated in response to what was being viewed by the ROV during the test performed in tranquil conditions of the Salish Sea. There are ongoing investigations into the causes of the failure of these tests by the US House Natural Resources Committee as well as by the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

• 
  Rebuilding of the containment dome at the Port of Bellingham by contractors of Superior Energy Services, Greenberry Industrial on behalf of Shell Oil Company.
• 
  The repaired and improved containment dome is hoisted onto the Arctic Challenger prior to leaving for testing.
• 
  The Arctic Challenger is towed by tugs Arctic Titan and Lindsay Foss out to the testing site just north of Samish Island in the southern end of Bellingham Bay.