Here, amid the densely packed suburban sprawl of greater New York City, three miles shy of New Jersey's northern border, a towering drill rig is plumbing deep into the bedrock at a rate of about 25 feet per hour.
Mexican trucking executives say that even if border blockades are lifted by the end of this year, as President Bush has promised, only a few of the biggest Mexican rigs could make deliveries deep into the United States.
When the Deepwater Horizon rig, drilling an exploratory well deep into rock through a mile of water and three miles into the ocean floor off the Louisiana coast, struck a highly pressurized pocket of oil and gas, causing an explosion, it was in some ways a consequence of this iterative, competitive game, each generation of discoveries pushing further into the unknown.
A Consolidated Edison truck, typically used to vacuum flooded areas, was rigged so its hose could stretch deep into the tunnel and suck out what it could.
Last week, a Nabors Industries rig contracted to SM Energy was visibly drilling well into the night, steam rising as crews drilled deep into the earth despite plunging temperatures approaching -20 Fahrenheit (-29 Celsius).
It noted that money for federal regulators had remained static for 20 years while the risks associated with drilling increased dramatically as rigs moved into deeper and deeper waters.
And those risks only multiply as the rigs push into deeper and deeper water under the gun of consumer and investor demand for more.
When we opened the door to the doghouse (where the operations for the rig — computers, telephone, and coffeemaker — were sheltered), the most overwhelming sound was that of the drill bit barking as it wound its way deep into the earth.
Even with waves crashing against the keel, the rig could steady itself for the precision work of sending drill pipes more than six miles down, dead straight, through the ocean floor and deep into the earth's crust.
and advancing deep into Syria.
