SPE/IADC

SPEIIADC 21999

A Task Force Approach to Reducing Stuck Pipe Costs

W.B. Bradley, * BP Research, and D. Jarman, R.S. Plott, * R.D. Wood, T.R. Schofield, *
R.A. Auflick, * and D. Cocking, BP Exploration
*SPE Members

Copyright 1991, SPElIADC Drilling Conference.

This paper was prepared for presentation at the 1991 SPEJIADC Drilling Conference held in Amsterdam, 11-14 March 1991.

This paper was selected for presentation by an SPElIADC Program Committee following review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents of the
paper, as presented, have not been reviewed by the International Association of Drilling Contractors or the Society of Petroleum Engineers and are subject to correction by the author(s).
The material, as presented, does not necessarily reflect any position of the SPE or IADC, its officers, or members. Papers presented at SPEJIAOC meetings are SUbject to publication
, review by Editorial Committees of the SPE and IAOC. Permission to copy is restricted to an abstract of not more than 300 words. Iilustralions may not be copied. The abstract shouid
contain conspicuous acknowledgment of where and by whom the paper is presented. Write Publications Manager, SPE, P.O. Box 833836, Richardson, TX 75083-3836. Telex, 730989 SPEDAL.

A TASK FORCE APPROACH TO contribution to the total stuck pipe cost. For
REDUCING STUCK PIPE COSTS the North Sea wells, 29% of the total cost was due
SPE!IADC 21999 to differential sticking and 70% was attributed to
,mechanical sticking. Note that almost 50% of the
i costs were due to the hole becoming packed off.

AUTHORS In the Gulf Coast, Table 2, differential sticking

W.B. BRADLEY, D. JARMAN, R.S. PLOTT, R.D. WOOD, was the dominant cause accounting for 61% of the
,T.R. SCHOFIELD, R.A. AUFLICK AND D. COCKING total cost. Packing off was the other major
source of trouble accounting for-a third of the
total Gulf Coast stuck pipe costs.

ABSTRACT The distribution of stuck pipe incidents by the

type of operation underway when the pipe became
In 1989 BP formed a world wide task force to focus stuck was also analyzed. Tables 3 and 4 show
on lowering its stuck pipe costs. In its campaign these results, again for the North Sea and Gulf of
to reduce this cost, the task force gathered Mexico drilling. The results for both areas are
together key personnel from each of its three comparable. Becoming stuck while tripping
operating companies and its research centers. accounted for about 50% of all the stuck pipe
This paper reports on 'the methods used to produce incidents while another 40% occurred while the
a substantial reduction in its stuck pipe costs. pipe was stationary. Only about 10% of the
incidents of stuck pipe occurred while on bottom
IN'TRODUCTION drilling.

Stuck pipe costs are a major drilling trouble cost TASK FORCE APPROACH
for us and for the industry. Historically BP's
stuck pipe costs have exceeded $30 million per Efforts to reduce stuck pipe are not new in BP.
year and various estimates indicate industry stuck Steady progress has been made in the past by
pipe costs exceed $250 million per year. Operations and by Research and Development
efforts. The purpose of the task force was to
Figure 1 shows our stuck pipe costs for the years bring extra focus to further accelerate the
1985 - 1988. These costs were compiled from the reduction of BP's stuck pipe costs. The goals of
records of over 700 wells drilled. Average stuck this effort were to:
pipe cost per well (total cost divided by total
wells) is shown in Figure 2. For this period the 1. Get the industry's expertise on the
average stuck pipe cost per well amounted to prevention and cure of stuck pipe both
$170,000 for each well drilled. known and consistently ~ by all our
drilling staff and by contractor staff;
From the above wells, 98 were selected for a
detailed analysis of each stuck pipe occurrence. 2. Accelerate the transfer of technology to
Tables 1 and 2 show the breakdown of stuck pipe by operations; and
type of sticking for North Sea and for Gulf of
Mexico Wells. Shown are both percent incidents of 3. Quickly implement our new findings and
occurrence of stuck pipe and the percent ideas into our normal operating
practices.

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2 A TASK FORCE APPROACH TO REDUCING STUCK PIPE COSTS
The task force was formed in early 1989 and
included key staff from each of our three regional
operating companies and from BP Research. Wide
participation by staff was encouraged. The number
of authors to this paper is indicative of the
broad involvement and contribution to this effort.
Early on the task force identified a number of
ideas that we wanted to concentrate on to quickly
reduce our stuck pipe costs. These included:
1. We felt that improving stuck pipe
prevention would produce greater cost
reductions than improving methods to free
it once it has become stuck.
2. If we were going to reduce stuck pipe, we
would need to include the drilling
contractor of the service company. It
was clear that we couldn't do it alone.
3. The day to day prevention of stuck pipe
is largely in the hands of the rig
operations team. And, the driller is a
i l l member of that team; and
4. Each member of the rig team has an
important contribution to make in
controlling and solving stuck pipe
problems. Therefore, we needed to
encourage active communication within the
rig team.
With the above thoughts in mind the task force
developed and implemented a program of action that .
included four main thrusts;
1. A detailed analysis of past stuck pipe
incidents;
2. The development of a stuck pipe awareness
campaign;
3. Improvement in the transfer of our stuck
pipe technology to the rig operations
team; and
4. The development of improved methods to
warn the driller of impending stuck pipe.
Problem analysis:
The analysis included a review of overall stuck
pipe costs to determine if any major trends were
evident and a detailed study of 98 wells to
understand what the principal causes of our stuck
pipe were. This allowed us to focus our resources
on the main targets of opportunity. Some of the
results of this analysis were presented in the
previous section.
Awareness program:
In order to effectively communicate the stuck pipe
message to our drilling staff and contractor and
service company staff worldwide, the task force
chose to:
1. Create and distribute a monthly cartoon
message; and
842
SPE 21999
2. Run periodic stuck pipe competitions to
challenge staff on their knowledge of
stuck pipe. A prize was awarded to each
person who successfully completed the
competition.
Both the monthly cartoon messages and the
competitions were provided to all rigs and offices
of contractors drilling for BP worldwide. The
same applied to all of our drilling offices. A
typical cartoon is shown in Figure 3. As a
central character to highlight what can go wrong a
species of gremlin known as a "Stuckpiper" was
invented and used in each of the cartoons, Figure
4.
Technology transfer:
An important early objective of the task force was
to produce practical guidelines on how to avoid
stuck pipe. By drawing on the expertise within BP
and the industry we developed a compact 32 page
handbook outlining the principal mechanisms of
getting stuck and guidelines on how to avoid them.
This BP publication has been distributed to over
1300 BP and contractor staff to date. The
guidelines have been translated into Spanish and
into French to ensure the widest possible
dissemination of this information to the rig teams
worldwide.
A second objective of the task force was to
develop and present a two and half day course on
the guidelines aimed at the whole rig team. Each
class was designed to include a representative
team including a BP rig representative, a BP
drilling engineer, a tool pusher, a driller, a mud
engineer and a mud logger. Besides presenting the
material in the guidelines, the course was
constructed to emphasise the need for close
cooperation and good communication within the rig
team to successfully combat stuck pipe. This was
accomplished by presenting the course as a series
of practical drilling problems that the team
members solved together. This illustrated the
expertise each member could bring to the
successful solution of the problems. The course
has been presented both in English & in Spanish.
Stuck pipe warning:
From the analysis of past stuck pipe incidents it
was clear that improved detection and warning of
developing stuck pipe problems would be of major
help to the rig team in preventing many serious
stuck pipe problems. As a result an Rand D
project was started to review existing industry
warning capabilities. Out of this effort two
industry Drilling Engineering Association projects
were sponsored to develop a better understanding
of stuck pipe in the Gulf of Mexico and in the
North Sea. Efforts are ongoing.
RESULTS AND LIl:SSONS LICARNED
The results to date of the task force efforts are
both gratifying and a little surprising. The
lowering of our stuck pipe costs occurred more
quickly and to a greater degree than we had
anticipated. The results are due to the efforts
 W B BRADLEY, D JARMAN, R S PLOTT, R D WOOD, T R SCHOFIELD
SPE 21999 R A AUFLICK & D COCKING
of our drilling staff, and contractor and service
company staff worldwide, and are a real credit to
their active interest and skill.
The results for 1989 and 1990 are shown in Figures
5 and 6. Note that both total stuck pipe costs
and average stuck pipe cost per well have been
significantly reduced. Promoting stuck pipe cost
reduction to the field began in mid 1989 with the
distribution, of the Practical Guidelines for
Preventing Stuck Pipe to all drilling staff,
contractor as well as BP.
Figures 5 and 6 show that by the end of 1989,
total, stuck pipe costs were down by 30% and
average stuck pipe costs per well were down by
50%. This resulted in a 1989 savings of
approximately $10 million. In 1990 with the task
force program in full swing, costs continued to
drop. Based on extrapolating the first three
quarter's results to full year costs, total stuck
pipe costs and average stuck pipe costs both
showed a drop of over 70% from the averaged 1985-
1988 results.
These results are all the more important when you
consider that they came on top of already good
drilling performance. The 1985-1988 stuck pipe
costs represent only 3-5% of our total drilling
costs. Therefore, we are attacking the tail end
of the problem and getting the last bit of
improvement is always more difficult than
eliminating the first part of the problem.
Problem analysis:
The detailed analysis of a sample of 98 stuck pipe
wells from our overall stuck pipe data base
revealed a number of things. One of the most
important findings was the strong correlation
between the incidents of stuck pipe and the crew
shift change handover times. Figure 7 shows the
results of plotting these 98 incidents of stuck
i pipe as a function of when they occurred during
the day. Figure 7 shows the results broken into
three groups of tOto 2 hours (2 hours before to
2 hours after shift change), t 2 to 4 hours, and t
4 to 6 hours. With two shift changes per day
these three groupings cover the full 24 hour
period.
Note that in the two periods away from the
handover times (2-4 and 4-6 hours) there were an
average of 21 incidents per period, while the 0-2
hour period had 56 stuck pipe incidents. If we
assume that 21 incidents represents the number of
stuck pipe events that occurred without the effect
of the handover process, then the impact of
handover in the t 0-2 hour period on stuck pipe
amounts to an increase of 35 incidents or 36% of
the total stuck pipe incidents. That's an
increase in stuck pipe frequency of over 2 1 /2
times during this critical period. We also
observed an increased number of stuck pipe events
occuring around the time of crew change out. We
believe that this strong correlation between stuck
pipe and the handover process offers a clear area
of opportunity for improving our stuck pipe
performance.
Several other findings from this analysis are also
worth noting. First, we were able to confirm the
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3
positive effect of top drives on controlling stuck
pipe. We found that with a top drive the time to
free the drill string once it becomes stuck was
reduced over the time required with a kelly drive.
The average cost of a stuck pipe incident with a
top drive was one third the cost of an average
incident on a kelly equipped rig. We also found
that the failure of back-off and severance charges
was unacceptably high. Failure of a majority of
the charges to back-off or sever on the first try
was a common feature on the cases that were
studied. This is an area that is in need of study
and would be a good candidate for an industry
supported project.
Awareness program:
A strong emphasis on a communication program to
make people more aware of stuck pipe has, we feel,
been a key element in the success of this project.
During 1990 we have been supplying monthly
cartoons to rigs worldwide (on average about 35)
and to BP and contractor offices. Messages that
have been communicated by the monthly cartoons
have included:
1. Stuck pipe is an important and ongoing
problem;
2. Despite the fact that we drill a lot of
hole, stuck pipe isn't inevitable;
3. Each person has a part to play in
controlling stuck pipe - each person ~
make a difference; and
4. Drilling practice messages on hole
cleaning, tripping, overpull, bottom hole
assemblies etc.
Feedback has been positive. In fact, one of our
contractor's staff in Papua New Guinea composed
and sent us an unsolicited poem which we later
used in one of our monthly cartoons.
So far we have completed two competitions to
challenge BP, contractor and service company staff
on their knowledge of stuck pipe. The first
competition tested their knowledge on the material
that was contained in the Stuck Pipe Guidelines.
This competition produced 930 winners out of more
than 1300 entries. The second competition was
designed to be more difficult but still produced a
large response of 1100 entries and 750 winners.
It required a team solution to a practical
drilling situation which ended with the pipe
becoming stuck. The problem was portrayed on a
video tape and each team was asked a series of
questions on what happened and how would they have
changed the operation to prevent the pipe from
becoming stuck.
We have recently begun to use the cartoons and
competitions to target specific areas and
particularly difficult wells. We have also
translated some of the monthly cartoons into other
languages to better target local crews.
Technology transfer:
One of the results of the analysis that was done
showed that, after the fact, it was clear in most
4 A TASK FORCE APPROACH TO REDUCING STUCK PIPE COSTS SPE 21999

cases why we had become stuck. This strengthened
our view that we must get the existing knowledge
on the control of stuck pipe both known and
consistently used in our operations. Both the
guidelines and the rig operation stuck pipe
awareness course were focused on meeting this
need.
- promoting a rig team approach to tackling
the problem and by providing training on rig
team stuck pipe problem solving; and
- raising awareness of stuck pipe through a
coordinated worldwide communications program
for BP, contractor and service company staff.

We have held over 20 rig operations stuck pipe
awareneSs courses worldwide in Scotland, the Gulf
of Mexico area, Alaska, Norway and Colombia.
Overall more than 200 people have attended these
courses. More than 75% have been contractor and
service company staff, who have attended the
course as part of the team. Response by attendees
to these courses has been good. Surveys taken at
the completion of each course have singled out
that the team solution method of controlling stuck
pipe was the most important message that the
attendees got and planned to take away and apply
on their rigs.
General:
When the task force started with this effort we
thought that the principal gains would be made by
providing new technology to control stuck pipe.
What we have found is that most of the gains that
have been made to date have had more to do with
people. The attention that has been placed on
unleashing each individual's expertise and the
emphasis on team participation in controlling
stuck pipe has, in our opinion, been the main
reasons for the dramatic reduction in stuck pipe
costs that we have seen.
4. The handover process during shift change was
responsible for 36% of all stuck pipe
incidents.
5. The use of top drives reduced the time
required to free the drill string on the
average by one third when compared to kelly
equipped rigs.
6. The failure of back-off and severance charges
to perform was unacceptably high. This is an
area that needs further work and would be a
good candidate for an industry sponsored
project.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors would like to thank Bp's drilling
staff, and contractor and service company staff
for their contributions to this effort. We would
also like to note Ian Pitkethly's contributions to
the development & running of the awareness
program;Final~y~ we would like to thank BP for
allowing 'us to publish this paper.

We are now applying these lessons learned to other

areas of drilling, such as well control and
safety, with the expectation of similar,
improvements. We have also been approached by a
number of other companies about sharing our
awareness program and our stuck pipe rig
operations course with them.

Finally, we believe that the stuck pipe probl$M

will not go away and stay away without constant
attention to it. As with safety, vigilance has to
be maintained to ensure that hard won, high
standards are not allowed to erode through
familiarity. And as new technology becomes
available, we will be able to drill more
aggressively and at the same time control stuck
pipe costs.

CONCLUSIONS

1. A task fOrce approach to stuck pipe has

produced more than a 70% reduction in our
worldwide stuck pipe costs in the last year
and a half.

2. We believe that these results have been

primarily due to focusing our attention on
improving people's performance rather than to
the introduction of new technology.

3. Key elements in this effort involved:

- recognizing the importance of the drilling

contractor, and service company staff role in
helping us control stuck pipe;

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 SPE 21999

A BREAKDOIIN or STlICK PIl" BY ~

A II1UU1lI)01I1I' or ,;oat UP' BY ~q nPII:or STICIl:ING - GULlI' or MlXICO
nP' or STIC!a!!!i - 1I01l~ SSA

nP' or DlCmlllft COS~

nP' or DlCmlllft COS~ STICIl:ING (' 01' ~U.) (' 01' ~O~U.)
S~IClUNG (t or ~AL) (t or ~AL)

DIFFERENTIAL 40 61
DIFFERENTIAL 23 29
MECHANICAL
MECHANICAL - PACKED OFF 36 34
- PACKED OFF 37 47 - JAMMED 24 5
- JAMMED 21 23

SALT 14 1
OTHER - -
OTHER 5 - 100' 100'

100' 100'

A BREAKDOIIN 01' STOClt 1'11'11: BY

A BRJUUalOIIN or STOClt UP' BY OPBIlATION - GULl' 01' MBXICO
OPBIlATION - IIOIl~R SEA

DlCmll:ll'!
DlCmll:ll'! OpBIlA~ION (t OF ~O~U.)
OpBIlATION (t or ~O~AL)

TRIPPING 52
TRIPPING 45
ON BOTTOM 12
ON BOTTOM 10
PIPE STATIONARY 34
PIPE STATIONARY 42

OTHER 3
OTHER -

100%
100'

300
40

250
30

$
20 200
(Million)
$
(Thousand)
150
10

100
1985 1986 1987 1988
Year

1985 1986 1987 1988

Year
Figure 1 YEARLY STUCK PIPE COSTS

Figure 2 AVERAGE STUCK PIPE COST PER WELL

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