British Petroleum timeline

Third-Largest Public Pension Fund in United States Initiates Lawsuit Against BP

New York's public pension fund is suing BP over huge losses caused by the oil giant's plunging stock price, CNNMoney reports. The New York State... Read more

BP Claims Well Could Be Capped Weeks Ahead of Schedule

The relief well that is supposed to finally stanch the oil flow from the Deepwater Horizon may be ready as early as July 27, BP is now telling the... Read more

BP Places New Containment Cap Atop Leaking Gulf Oil Well

A new containment cap has just moved into position atop the ruptured oil well beneath the site of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, and officials are... Read more

BP Begins Testing of New, Tighter-Fitting Cap

BP allayed last-minute government fears of making the disaster worse and began testing the new, tighter-fitting cap today that could finally choke... Read more

BP Stock Jumps 7% with Successful Capping of Gulf Leak

British Petroleum's (NYSE:BP) share price jumped in late-day trading as news came out that the oil company had successfully stopped their broken... Read more

House Committee Votes to Block BP Drilling for Up to Seven Years

Rep. Bart Stupak downplayed concerns that blocking from BP from new drilling would affect its ability to pay for the Gulf cleanup. "I'm not going... Read more

Gulf Oil Leak Contained

A tightly fitted cap was successfully keeping oil from gushing into the Gulf of Mexico for the first time in three months, BP said Thursday. The... Read more

BP Extends Test of Well Cap Beyond Initial 48-Hour Timeframe

As this afternoon marks the critical 48-hour point since BP plugged its Macondo well, engineers tensely monitor pressure readings and underwater... Read more

Seepage Detected from Another Well Near Capped Leak

The federal government's oil spill chief said Tuesday that seepage two miles from BP's oil cap is coming from another well, tamping down fears that... Read more

Oil Firms Announce Development of Spill Rapid-Response System

Readers who've been following BP's response to the Deepwater Horizon spill will find the containment system familiar: It is modeled after some of... Read more

Tropical Storm Bonnie Forces Suspension of Relief Well Drilling

The tropical storm Bonnie has forced BP to temporarily suspend drilling on its relief well in the Gulf of Mexico. Work to permanently plug the oil... Read more

BP Admits to Minor Alteration of Gulf Spill Images Using Photoshop

The oil giant was forced to issue new guidelines to staff to “refrain from doing (sic) cutting-and-pasting” after several official company images... Read more

Technician Tells Investigators Oil Rig Alarm System Disabled on Day of Blast

Williams testified that he had asked before about the settings and was told the company didn't want a false alarm waking people at night. Williams... Read more

BP Ships Return to Gulf Leak After Departure of Tropical Storm Bonnie

The effort to plug BP's leaky oil well in the Gulf of Mexico was back on track today as the skies cleared and crews raced to stop the gusher for... Read more

Reports Find Surface of Oil Spill Virtually Gone

On the 100th day of the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, there is word of a stunning disappearance of surface crude from the BP... Read more

BP Executive Tony Hayward Announces Departure in October

"The Gulf of Mexico explosion was a terrible tragedy. As the man in charge of BP when it happened, I will always feel a deep responsibility,... Read more

Scientists Find Mix of Oil and Dispersent Entering Food Chain

The dispersant, scientists say, has broken down the oil into droplets, making them small enough to find their way under the tiny crab larvae's... Read more

Bob Dudley, New BP CEO, Proposes Cleanup 'Scaleup'

Bob Dudley, who heads BP's oil spill recovery and will take over as CEO in October, said it's "not too soon for a scaleback" in the cleanup, and in... Read more

Departing BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward Defends Response to Oil Spill

Tony Hayward , the departing chief executive of BP PLC, is unrepentant about how the energy giant responded to the U.S.'s largest offshore oil... Read more

Study Shows Gulf Spill Largest of Its Kind in History

Nearly five million barrels of oil have gushed from BP’s well — and about 800,000 have been captured by containment efforts —since the Deepwater... Read more

BP Begins 'Static Kill' to Plug Oil Leak

Crews should know within hours whether the mud is pushing down the oil as envisioned. But engineers still won't know for more than a week whether... Read more

BP Announces Success of 'Static Kill'

The operation was "textbook. It went exactly as we would have expected," a BP exec told CNN, adding that the firm's engineers won't decide whether... Read more

Oil Discovered Oozing from Louisiana Ground

These days in Louisiana, even the hermit crabs are digging oil wells. Researchers on a barrier island off the southeastern Louisiana coast who were... Read more

US Government Report Indicates Three-Quarters of Oil has Disappeared

And officials say they’re pretty confident about their calculations. “There’s absolutely no evidence that there’s any significant concentration of... Read more

BP Begins Cementing of Oil Well

Retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen has approved the cementing, but he stresses that BP must still go ahead with a second, ongoing well-plugging... Read more