Oil Well Malfunction | Video

Evan Kruegel | 12/27/2012

Two oil wells this month have spewed oil as a result of a well malfunction. One was in New Town and the other in Watford City. Today in Williams County another well malfunctioned. There wasn`t any oil spewing out this time, but there was a lot of smoke.

If you were driving west on Highway 2 today, you probably noticed the smoke drifting up into the sky. A Statoil well, located just off of the truck bypass, had a dump valve stuck open. Oil was able to leak out of the valve and into the flare pit. When the oil and fire mixed, it created a large cloud of smoke.

Statoil representative Russell Rankin says this isn`t a common problem, but it does happen from time to time.

The problem has since been taken care of, and no one was injured.

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