Joint venture partner Tap Oil said wireline evaluation operations had been completed on the well but mechanical difficulties during the suspension operations resulted in the well being permanently abandoned.
Apache had operational issues with the same well last month which led it to abandoning its initial sidetrack of the well and attempting a second.
Taunton-5/5H was originally anticipated to take about 40 days to reach a total depth of 1400 metres, however in the end it took 76 days to reach a total depth of 1353 metres, with a horizontal well path of roughly 2000 metres being drilled through the Early Cretaceous target formations.
The
