Tallest fixed oil platform

What to remember

Most of Bullwinkle is out of sight. Of the 529 m of this fixed oil platform, installed in the Gulf of Mexico in 1988, 412 m lie below the waterline. It is a pile-supported steel structure, and no other fixed oil platform rises as high.

The whole platform weighs 77,000 tons, of which the steel jacket accounts for 49,375 tons. When it was built, it was the third tallest freestanding structure ever made, behind only the CN Tower and the Ostankino Tower. It was also the tallest in the United States, 1.8 m taller than the pinnacle of the Sears Tower.

The platform sits in Green Canyon Block 65, about 260 km southwest of New Orleans. The total field development reportedly cost US$500,000,000.