From Reuters:  (And for coverage from AP, go here).

It looks as if the Castro clan will not be joinin' the Clampetts any time soon.   Gosh durnbangit.....  They was all so lookin' furward to it.

Cuba Offshore Drilling: Another Well Declared A Failure

HAVANA, Aug 6 (Reuters) - Another offshore well in Cuban waters has been declared a failure after oil was found, but in rock too dense to allow production, Cuban media reported on Monday.

Communist Party newspaper Granma said a well drilled by a Malaysia's giant state-owned oil company Petronas in partnership with Russia's Gazprom Neft showed “the existence of an active oil system, "but in a geological formation where “rocks are very compacted and don't have the capacity to deliver significant quantities of oil and gas."

Because of that “it cannot be qualified as a commercial discovery, the paper said.

The unsuccessful well was the latest blow to Cuba's hopes to tap into offshore oil fields it says may hold 20 billion barrels of oil and help it achieve energy independence.

Currently, it relies heavily on socialist ally Venezuela and its cancer-stricken President Hugo Chavez to meet its oil needs.

Spanish oil company Repsol hit a dry hole in Cuban waters in May and said it would likely pull out of the communist country after 12 years of operations and two unsuccessful wells.

Granma said Petronas and Gazprom would continue to evaluate data collected during the drilling, which was completed on July 31, and conduct more seismic studies with an eye toward another possible attempt.

It said that the oil found in this well “could extend to other zones in the four offshore blocks leased by the two companies and perhaps beyond.

The Petronas well was drilled in 7,408 feet (2,258 meters) of water off Cuba's northern coast, using the same Chinese-built, Italian-owned semi-submersible drilling rig brought to Cuba by Repsol earlier this year.

Granma said the rig will now be passed on to Venezuela's PDVSA to drill a well off Cuba's western tip.