On April 20 , 2010 perhaps one of the most catastrophic events in offshore drilling occurred.

The DEEPWATER HORIZON a vessel operated by Transocean for deep sea drilling violently exploded leaving 11 men dead, over 100 injured and causing one of the largest manmade disasters.  Scott Bickford was privileged to represent one of the widows Natalie Roshto and her 3 year old son as well as Mike Williams, a heroic oilfield worker whose story came to be told in  the movie DEEPWATER HORIZON.  Bickford and co-counsel worked for over a year first taking crucial testimony and working to reach settlements with BP.

In the case of the Deepwater Horizon, Scott Bickford, a lawyer for a rig worker who survived the explosions, said the mud was being extracted from the riser…

“Suddenly, with explosive fury, water and mud came hurtling up the pipes and onto the deck, followed by the ominous hiss of natural gas,” The NY Times goes on to report. “In seconds, it touched some spark or flame.”

60 Minutes Editorial

Bickford worked from the onset tirelessly to preserve evidence of the explosion to secure his client's rights:

“The rig exploded on April 20, 2010, and Natalie Roshto sued in U. S. district court on April 21.

The complaint stated that "his body has not yet been located."

Bickford amended it five days later to sue two more Transocean entities, another BP entity, and cement contractor Halliburton.

He wrote that the search for Shane Roshto had been called off.

Bickford pressed BP for evidence, and BP responded that it needed to take actions that would destroy or modify some items.

At a hearing, Zainey ordered BP to keep a log of such actions and reasons for them.

He said, "Mr. Bickford, BP will eventually provide you through discovery with the actions that it has taken, but to do so as quickly as you would like, I believe, could in fact hinder the recovery effort."

He said, "This court is not going to interfere with anything that the United States Coast Guard is doing."

He said, "I think any further action by the court would be more of a hindrance than assistance in the protection of the rights of the plaintiff”

Settlement Reached with BP

“Human error, basically brought down, a very large vessel and put a lot of people at risk and killed 11,” Bickford said.