Quadrant Energy, an Australian oil and gas exploration company, has experienced drilling challenges that resulted in a delay during drilling operations at its Outtrim East-1 well, offshore Australia.

The Outtrim East-1 well is located within the WA-155-P(1) exploration permit in the North West Shelf of Australia where Quadrant is the operator with 71.5%, and Carnarvon Petroleum is its partner with 28.5% interest.

The well was spud on June 18 using the Noble Tom Prosser jack-up drilling rig.

According to Carnarvon Petroleum’s statement on Friday, the well has reached the 12-1/4” hole section at a depth of 1,011 meters.

The company stated that the first casing string was placed shallower than expected due to drilling challenges in the shallow-hole section of the well at a depth of around 400 meters which resulted in a 10-day delay. The company added that the well has drilled through this ‘challenging section’.

At the moment, the well is rigging up to run the 9-5/8” casing liner at a depth of 1,011 meters. Carnarvon said that, after the casing liner has been properly cemented, the drilling will continue to the oil zone where 90 meters of conventional coring will take place.

After the core has been obtained, the final part of the well will be drilled to a Total Depth (TD) of 1,440 meters.

Carnarvon said that the expected cost towards the company will be somewhere in the region of $10.5 million.