Shell Restarts Some Gulf of Mexico Oil, Natural Gas Output

By Christian Schmollinger

Sept. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Royal Dutch Shell Plc said it has restarted 26,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day of oil and natural gas production in the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

The remaining output should be back online by next week, Shell, Europe's largest oil company, said in a statement on its Web site.

Shell is still assessing the damage to facilities in the western Gulf and expects drilling operations to start over the next day or two, the statement said. Production will begin over the same period and ramp up through next week.

The company has deployed 227 workers to the Gulf as of yesterday out of 550 workers total and they expect full staffing in the next day or two.

To contact the reporter on this story: Christian Schmollinger in Singapore at christian.s@bloomberg.net.