The cement bond logging thing is a "red herring" if the leak past the cement was at the shoe (i.e. the cement plug furtherst down) the cement bond logging operation would have only shown how good the uppermost cement plug was.

Four tests were carried out two in February, both failed, and it was the results of the second of those tests that were passed ashore to BP on the 8th March. A third test was undertaken on 17th April which again failed and finally a fourth test was carried out on the 19th April which was successful. In this test 8 barrels of retardent per 100 gallons of cement was used, the instruction given by BP was for Halliburton to use 9 barrels per 100 gallons.

Talk in the media refer to testing and labs and somehow create the impression that cement samples are made up and sent ashore to be lab tested ashore, they are not the "lab" they are talking about is normally a "portacabin" on the rig where cement blocks are made up and tested on site - it has to be done that way as the cement you test has got to be the cement you pour down the hole.

What remains to be seen is exactly how Halliburton flagged up to BP that the cement samples they reported on on the 8th March failed test, as Halliburton had previously said that they had told BP that the cement was OK - That is the apparent lie they have been caught out on.

I have always said from the start that two things failed:

1) The cement job

2) The BOP

Both were out of BP's control and neither were BP responsibilities, that is why Operating Companies hire specialist contractors. When things go wrong those companies should also shoulder their share of the blame.