Poor management and critical mistakes by BP and its contractors led to the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history, according to the final report of the largest U.S. government probe into last year's massive Gulf oil spill.
Investigators from the U.S. Coast Guard and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management scattered blame for the accident on the companies involved while also saying stronger regulations could have helped prevent the catastrophe.
This final report has been heavily anticipated by investors eager for clues on possible legal ramifications BP and its partners may face from the drilling disaster.
BP stock was up $1.04 to $37.94 in New York shortly after release of the report.
In the days leading up to the accident, BP made a series of decisions that complicated cementing operations and may have contributed to the ultimate failure of the cement on the well, the investigators found.
BP failed to communicate these decisions and the "increasing operational risks" to Transocean, the contractor that owned and operated the Deepwater Horizon rig, according to the report.
"As a result, BP and Transocean personnel onboard the Deepwater Horizon ... did not fully identify and evaluate the risks inherent in the operations that were being conducted at Macondo," the report said.
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