This is July 18, 1918 and Kansas Natural Gas Company is in the process of discovering the Elk City Field in Elk County, Kansas. The well name is the Simmons No. 2 and its cable tools had just banged out about 3 feel of Mississipian Limestone at 1,340 feet. When she came in she lauched the bottom hole bit and weight bars, now parted, about 150 feet in the air. Its rather amazing these three photos are snagged when they were, but good for us.
The parted section of the BHA is now being ejcted and all the drill line behind it is being blow out of the hole.
Est. FCP on 8 inch was 420 PSI and IP'd for about 1.2MMCFGPD. Thru use of orifice plates they can measure dry gas flows pretty accturately back then.
Something similar to this occured in Mexico in 1910 that I recently wrote about (El Jefe) but that well blew the bailer and drill line out of the hole and into palm trees 2000 feet away.
And here is the aftermath, 1,300 feet of drill line on the ground, the bit and pieces of the BHA driven in the ground like fence posts.
The Elk City Field got 52 wells drilled in over the next four years, on 1000 foot spacing and it went on to produce over 7.5 BCF of gas before being abandoned.
The oilfield was fun back when Mama Nature still had some bottom hole pressure. She kept you on your toes back then.