now, of course, the debate going on here now is are we ready to go back into the gulf of mexico to begin drilling? are the safety responses there to be able to respond to an accident like the one that happened at bp? since that disaster there are a couple of companies that have been put together which will be the first responders in the case of any potential blowout. one of them is the helix corporation which was involved in mitigation of the bp spill. the other one is the marine well containment company, which is the company that has been contracted for this will, and the drilling permit was contingent on that company being involved. john hollowell is the executive vice president of shell deepwater, and john people want to know can they have confidence in a company like shell to go back into the water to drill the first well, what is different since the bp disaster, what is different about your company that wouldn t allow this
john roberts is streaming to us live from an oil rig about 75 miles off the coast of louisiana, john. reporter: jon, good morning to you. we are on board the noble jim thompson. this rig is drilling the very first well to be approved since the moratorium was put in place after the bp oil spill. we are about a hundred miles off-shore. about 150 miles from houston, 150 miles from louisiana, right out there in the heart of the gulf of mexico. this is being drilled in what s known as the cardamon deep. that well will be eventually about 27,000 feet deep. right now they are at about 16,000 feet. on the way down, day 43 of drilling. shell received the very first permit to go back into the gulf after the bp oil spill. it received another permit for a series of wells that will be about 72 miles off of the coast of louisiana, very close to where the bp disaster was.
jenna: developing stories we re watching right now on fox. the mayor of new orleans says his city is safe from flooding for now. the opening of the morgue morgaza spillway stopped the water. a short time ago ryan bowed out. nato is dropping leaflets and broadcasting messages to pro-qaddhafi forces to simply give up. jon: there is a major push underway to expand off-shore drilling in this country. and fox news has an exclusive look at the first new well in the gulf of mexico since the moratorium on deepwater drilling was lifted in october.
disaster to happen. the key to preventing a disaster is planning. a lot of planning has gone into this well for several months in order to be ready to drill it. one of the keys is we set aside a full suite of requirements, the new requirements and standards by the regulator. part of that we were doing before the incident. two key things have enhanced our ability to drill. one you mentioned the marine company. we ve also enhanced our spill response capability associated with containment. reporter: people are paying $4 a tkpw-l for gasoline. we saw the house pass three bills to try to expand off-shore billing. likely it won t pass by the senate but the president over the weekend says he wants to take steps to open up more areas to drilling. will expanded drilling have any impact on the price of gasoline. opponents say hey we are only getting 8% of our gasoline from the gulf of mexico it s going to have no impact on prices,
down at the wholesale level. a lot of people are not seeing that translate to lower prices at the pump, alex. i want to pick up on something you said, how the president wants some drilling here but not as much as republicans do. overall, the fact the president is calling for drilling, i mean, how much of a shift is this for him? well, you know, i mean he s putting some meat on the bones of something he s talked about over the course of the last couple year, the last two states of the union. he wants more domestic drilling. this morning in his radio addre address, you saw a bite of it earlier, he has a couple more proposals. he wants to ramp up drilling in the gulf of mexico and off the alaskan coast. he wants to expand oil companies ability to bid on leases in a gigantic area in northern alaska called the national petroleum reserve alaska. this is not anwar but an equally large area to the west of that. he wants to extend the leases, and this is a sensitive political issue, down i