WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 (UPI) -- The U.S. government declared the undersea oil well that devastated the Gulf of Mexico this summer finally closed Sunday.
"Additional regulatory steps will be undertaken, but we can now state, definitively, that the Macondo well poses no continuing threat to the Gulf of Mexico," said former Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, who led the disaster response, CNN reported.
BP, which owns the well that exploded April 20, began final cementing to plug it Friday. Pressure tests early Sunday confirmed the cement was holding, and the Interior Department's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management pronounced the well dead at 5:54 a.m. local time.
The blowout sank the oil rig Deepwater Horizon and killed 11 workers aboard. The well spewed an estimated 4.9 million barrels of crude into the gulf before it was temporarily capped in July.
At the White House, President Barack Obama hailed the "final termination" of the well and pledged the government will continue to do "everything possible to make sure the Gulf Coast recovers fully from this disaster."
