On Wednesday, May 21, 2014, the Phone Duty Officer from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - Region 8 (EPA) received notification from the Utah Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) of an out-of-control oil production well near Green River, UT, owned and operated by SW Energy of Salt Lake City, UT. The well blowout was reportedly discovered on Wednesday morning by the operator, who relayed that an estimated 100 bbls/hr were flowing off site and into a nearby wash leading to the Green River some 4.5 miles west. The operator, SW Energy, along with field staff from the Utah Department of Natural Resources - Division of Oil, Gas and Mining (UT DOGM) and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM), began bringing in resources to contain the spill and recover the spilled material.
The Phone Duty Officer dispatched the Response Duty On-Scene Coordinator to the scene following the report from UTDEQ and a request for support. EPA arrived on-scene in the early morning hours on May 22, 2014 and began working in Unified Command with BLM, DOGM, UTDEQ, and SW Energy to control the source, contain and recover the spilled material, and assess the impacts from the spill, ultimately preventing the spill from reaching the Green River.
