Oil Search told the ASX yesterday afternoon that the Nabrajah joint venture had abandoned testing of the Kholan Dolomite during the week after additional attempts to clean up the well and increase the oil rate with a new electrical submersible pump (ESP) had proved unsuccessful.

The planned production logging tool ( program was also abandoned due to a mechanical problem in the test string. A seven-inch liner was then run over the Kholan dolomite, the bridge plug removed, and the well cleaned out.

Earlier this month an open-hole drill stem test over the Kholan interval, at a depth of 2626-2720m, flowed 1744 barrels per day of fluid, comprising 319 barrels of oil and 1455 barrels of brine.

Yesterday Oil Search managing director Peter Botten said further stimulation of the Kholan dolomite section might be undertaken at a later date. The design of any fraccing program would be determined by the results of on-going core analysis.

The rig used to drill Nabrajah-10 would soon be moved to the Nabrajah-11 site, located 1km west of the Nabrajah-5 production well. Nabrajah-11 would be drilled in the same fault terrace as Nabrajah-5 and Nabrajah-10, with the objective of the well being to further appraise the Kholan and basement potential in the Nabrajah-5 fault terrace.

Nabrajah-10 is 1km northeast of the Nabrajah-5 production well.

Earlier this year PNG-focused oil and gas producer Oil Search said it hoped on-going exploration at Nabrajah would enable it to make significant additions to its reserves after reporting a 4.8% drop for 2005.

The participants in the Nabrajah-10 well are: operator DNO ASA (56.67%) Oil Search (Yemen) (28.33%) and The Yemen Company (15%), which is being carried through this phase of the program.