Murphy Oil Corp. has elected to terminate the contract for the ultra-deepwater drillship Discoverer Deep Seas.
The rig's contract was scheduled to end in November 2016. Transocean, which owns and operates the unit, says it will be compensated for the early termination through a lump-sum payment that includes adjustments for operating costs.
The unit was completed in 2001 in the Astano yard in Spain and had been working for Murphy Oil since October 2013.
The move is the latest in a number of early contract terminations for Transocean, following an early termination notice for the drillship Discoverer Americas from Statoil in December 2015, and another one from Shell for the Polar Pioneer semisubmersible, also in December.