THE blockbuster BP oil spill trial has opened with a scathing attack on the poor safety standards that led to the worst environmental disaster in US history.
Billions are at stake in the New Orleans courtroom where a federal judge is tasked with determining how much BP and its subcontractors should pay for the devastating Gulf of Mexico spill.
US prosecutors are determined to prove that gross negligence caused the April 20, 2010 blast that killed 11 workers and sank the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig, sending millions of barrels of oil gushing into the sea.
BP is equally determined to avoid a finding of gross negligence, which would drastically increase its environmental fines to as much as $US17 billion ($A16.5 billion).
BP is also hoping to shift much of the blame - and cost - to rig operator Transocean and subcontractor Halliburton, which was responsible for the runaway well's faulty cement job.
Transocean's poor safety record was the focus of the first lawyer to speak, Jim Roy of the plaintiffs steering committee, which represents thousands of individuals and business impacted by the spill.
Roy told the court the Swiss giant's top safety official on the multimillion-dollar rig "was not even minimally competent for this job".
"His training consisted of a three-day course. Amazingly, he had never been aboard the Deepwater Horizon," Roy said, noting the blowout was the seventh major incident aboard a Transocean rig in the space of 17 months.
It took 87 days to cap BP's runaway well, which blackened beaches in five states and crippled the region's tourism and fishing industries in a tragedy that riveted the nation.
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