What "Armageddon" got right about space drilling, and what it (mostly) didn’t
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This summer, Marketplace Tech is exploring tech in movies. Today, we’re looking at the Bruce Willis classic “Armageddon,” which was the highest-grossing film of 1998. Willis’ character, Harry Stamper, is a "deep core" oil driller sent into space to drill a hole and drop a bomb in an asteroid hurtling toward Earth. We meet Harry on an offshore oil rig, managing a surly crew, with oil flying everywhere. It's a depiction of oil-drilling life that has stuck with the public, but has very little to do with reality. Eric van Oort, a professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Texas, talked to us about the space drilling technology in “Armageddon." (08/16/18)
This summer, Marketplace Tech is exploring tech in movies. Today, we’re looking at the Bruce Willis classic “Armageddon,” which was the highest-grossing film of 1998. Willis’ character, Harry Stamper, is a “deep core” oil driller sent into space to drill a hole and drop a bomb in an asteroid hurtling toward Earth. We meet Harry on an offshore oil rig, managing a surly crew, with oil flying everywhere. It’s a depiction of oil-drilling life that has stuck with the public, but has very little to do with reality. Eric van Oort, a professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Texas, talked to us about the space drilling technology in “Armageddon.” (08/16/18)
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