Transocean Settles Federal Deepwater Horizon Claims For $1.4B

The Justice Department on Thursday announced that a settlement of $1.4 billion had been reached with Transocean  for civil and criminal claims concerning the Deepwater Horizon oil rig blowout in 2010. An explosion at the oil rig, owned by driller Transocean, left 11 men dead and millions of gallons of oil flowing into the Gulf of Mexico.

Transocean agreed to one criminal misdemeanor violation of the Clean Water Act, for which is will pay a fine of $100 million, and over the next five years, the company will pay civil penalties of $1 billion. Also part of the criminal settlement, the company will pay the National Academy of Sciences and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation $150 million each to be applied to oil spill prevention and response in the Gulf, as well as natural resource restoration projects. The company also agreed to five years of federal monitoring of its drilling practices.

The agreement is still subject to public comment and court approval.

The maritime lawyers at Schechter, Shaffer & Harris, L.L.P., Accident & Injury Lawyers represent workers injured in offshore drilling accidents, including the Deepwater Horizon explosion.