B.H.P. Calls First Oil Well ‘Manga’

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32252, 21 March 1970, Page 12

B.H.P. Calls First Oil Well ‘Manga ’

Broken Hill Proprietary, Ltd, said in Melbourne yesterday afternoon that the first New Zealand wildcat well to be drilled by Hematite Petroleum (N.Z.), Ltd; would be called “Manga,” the Press Association reports.

This is the Maori word for; barracouta—the name of the! first well drilled in Bass Strait which is now supplying Melbourne with natural gas. The well will be situated in the Taranaki Basin, 30 miles offshore to the west of Kawhia Harbour.

It will be drilled by Shell, BP, Todd Oil Services, Ltd, using the Sedco 135 F rig, and will be in 279 feet of water with a programmed depth of 11,500 feet. B.H.P. said the operations centre for the well would be the Shell, BP base at New Plymouth. The well is expected to bei spudded immediately on com-, pletion of the well which is I now being drilled by New Zea-; land Aquitaine. Manga is in licence No. 687; which is held join'ly by Essoj Exploration and Production; (N.Z.) Inc., and New Zealand; Off-shore Petroleum Corpora-' tion.

By drilling Manga. Hema-; tite would earn 50 per cent ini the licence, which covers! about 262 square miles, 8.H.P.: said. At the same time that| B.H.P. announced drilling plans for its first New Zealand well, plans were re-

vealed for shipping the first crude oil from the company’s Bass Strait oil fields. The first shipment would leave Melbourne for Adelaide early next week, a spokesman for Hematite said last night.

The oil would be from the Barracouta and Halibut fields, but the exact quantity of the shipment had not yet been decided, he said. The Barracouta field has been producing crude oil since October, and Halibut came on stream last week.