If anyone here thinks these drilling issues are actually issues,...

If anyone here thinks these drilling issues are actually issues, you’re in the wrong game.

No exploration company in the world drills wells without issues, it’s commonplace to get stuck, break things downhole, and ultimately have to sidetrack. It is obviously basin dependant but from what I’ve seen in Australia as high as 1 in 10 exploration wells (excluding CSG) require sidetracks or some sort of significant ‘rethink’ whilst you’re drilling.

For those who want to see what a difficult drilling area looks like go look at the history of Buru. Pretty simple vertical wells, but the geology is significantly more difficult. I think they had issues on basically every 2nd well if not every well and probably done as many sidetracks as they’ve done drills!

Cooper Basin, if you look through the reports of the likes of Santos, Beach, Vintage who are all considered top tier drillers...plenty of sidetracks to be had in those reports too, and the Cooper Basin has been drilled for 60+ years.

To be honest I think STX got lucky drilling the last well without any significant/costly issues. Exploration is a game of statistics and luck, you can’t have it all.