Kuwaiti firefighters put out on Monday the first of seven oil wells blazing in Iraq vast southern Rumaila field as sporadic guerrilla-style resistance by armed Iraqis continued nearby. A crack team from Kuwait Oil Company is now tackling six other wellheads on fire at the southern end of the 50-mile-long Rumaila oilfield near the border with Kuwait. The Kuwaiti experts used techniques mastered while battling more than 700 wellhead fires set by Iraqi troops fleeing the Gulf state in 1991 after a U.S.-led campaign ended Baghdad's seven-month occupation. "We have just finished putting out the fire and are in the process of capping the well," a senior Kuwaiti oil official told Reuters.
The team, which fights fires only during daylight hours, could take up to four weeks to finish its task. Aside from the wells set alight, another 10-15 have been mined, he said. While British troops were firming their grip on the southern oil region, a Kuwaiti oil executive said there were security problems in the northern section of the Rumaila field. Small groups of Iraqi troops in civilian clothes made it unsafe for journalists to travel to the region, British Lt. Col. Rob Partridge told Reuters. "At the moment there are groups of Iraqi forces dressed in civilian clothes in the area," he said. "They are all over the bloody place."
Farther east at Iraq's second city of Basra, Iraqi militia armed with rocket propelled grenades, hand grenades and AK-47 rifles were on the prowl around the 140,000-barrels-per-day Basra refinery. Southern fields normally account for half Iraq's oil output, ranked as the world's seventh largest exporter before the war.
I hope when this war is over the capture of these oil fields and the quick resolution of the oil fires gets the praise it deserves. |