Puka-2 was a deviated well designed to appraise the hydrocarbon potential of the Puka prospect north of the Puka-1 reservoir intersection. The Puka structure is a 2.5 km2 four-way dip closure at the Mt Messenger level in the eastern margin of the Taranaki Basin, southwestern corner of license PEP 51153. The well was drilled in two separate parts using two different rigs with different KBDF elevations. The 12.25 inch top hole section of Puka-2 was drilled to 402mAHBKB using Drill Force Rig 1 from 28th November to 8th December 2012 and 9.625 inch surface casing was set at 401.6m. Drilling operations on the main 8.5 inch production hole using Drill Force Rig 6 commenced 29th January 2013 and reached a TD of 1905m on 10 February 2013. Within the basal section of the Mt Messenger Formation, an excellent quality 4.65m (3.3mTVD) of Mt Messenger sand was intersected at 1760m which exhibited good oil shows and 3.5% mud gas reading. After running wireline logs, the hole was cased and completed for later testing.