Pacific Drilling clinches drillship extension in Mauritania

Offshore drilling contractor Pacific Drilling has been awarded a one-well extension for its drillship working for French oil major Total in Mauritania. 

In its second quarter 2019 report on Monday, Pacific said that the contract for the Pacific Santa Ana drillship had been extended by Total for one well in Mauritania.

The contract starts in August and ends in September 2019. After that, in November 2019, the rig is scheduled to work for Petronas, also in Mauritania. This deal is scheduled to be completed in October 2020. Later, Total has two one-well options (each well estimated at approximately 60 days of work) whose start would follow contract with Petronas.

Pacific Drilling CEO, Bernie Wolford, said: “We added backlog for our fleet as an option was exercised for Pacific Santa Ana. The ramp-up of Pacific Khamsin, in preparation for its contract with Equinor, remains on schedule for start of operations in November.”

It is worth reminding that the 2011-built drillship received a contract to operate in Senegal for one firm well and in Mauritania for one option well with Total back in March and the contract started in April 2019.

According to information on Bassoe Offshore, the drillship’s dayrate under the part of the contract which expired at the end of July was $165,000.

Pacific Drilling reported a net loss for second-quarter 2019 of $73.6 million compared to net loss of $84 million in first-quarter 2019.

Pacific Drilling’s second-quarter 2019 contract drilling revenue was $76.4 million, which included $3.8 million in reimbursable revenue.

This compared to first-quarter 2019 contract drilling revenue of $65.9 million, which included $3.4 million in reimbursable revenue. The increase in revenue resulted primarily from the Pacific Santa Ana commencing operations with Total in Senegal.