US oil slick triggers emergency

[dennis tooth]

The US military may be called in to help contain a massive oil slick that has prompted the southern US state of Louisiana to declare a state of emergency.

 

The US defence department is on standby after officials said the leak was five times worse than previously thought, and could trigger a disaster of "national significance" on the Gulf coast.

 

Bobby Jindal, the governer of Louisiana, declared a state of emergency on Thursday when officials warned the slick could reach the shoreline as early as Friday, where its impact would be devastating for the environment.

 

A massive operation to mitigate the damage is already underway, but needs to be scaled up significantly if it is to be sucessful.

 

BP, the British energy company responsible for the damage caused by the leak, said it was grateful for the offer of help from the military.

 

"We'll take help from anyone, I mean we welcome the offer from the department of defence, we're working with the experts across the industry," Doug Suttles, chief operating officer of BP's exploration and production unit, said.

 

"We're going to do everything we can to minimise the impact of this event."

 

The oil leak began on April 20 after an explosion at the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig left 11 workers dead and led to it sinking two days later.

 

Disaster looms

 

The spill has sparked fears of an environmental disaster along the US Gulf coast, which could threaten wildlife as well as economically important fishing grounds and oyster beds.In video

 

 

US oil spill crisis continues

 

 

Clean-up crews have been struggling to control the slick, with a fleet of vessels dispatched earlier in the week hampered by strong winds and high seas.

 

Brandon Blackwell, a US coastguard spokesman in Louisiana, told Al Jazeera that authorities wanted to "fight this spill as far off shore as possible" but were expecting oil to hit the shoreline on Friday.

 

"Of course it will hurt the environment, local economies will be impacted," he said.

 

Blackwell advised people to stay away from coastline suffering from the oil spill, but that if people see unattended oil to let authorities know.

 

At a special White House briefing on the slick, the US coast guard said on Thursday it is being very aggressive in its response to the spill, but admitted at the same time is preparing for the worst case scenario of oil reaching shore.

 

Coast Guard Rear Admiral Sally Brice O'Hare said that the oil could reach landfall in the Mississipi Delta region by late Friday.

 

Leaking well

 

On Wednesday, BP engineers working with the coast guard set fire to parts of the slick, testing a technique to burn off some of the oil and slow its spread. Burning tests were expected to resume on Thursday.

 

 

 

An estimated 5,000 barrels of oil a day are still leaking into the Gulf [AFP]

 

 

 

Neither the US coast guard nor BP offered any new information on efforts to seal off the underwater well head that has caused the massive oil slick.

 

Four remote-controlled robotic submarines deployed to the leak site earlier in the week have so far failed to activate a shutoff device, called a "blowout preventer", at the head of the well.

 

As an emergency back-up, BP engineers are also working to construct a giant dome to place over the leaking well to contain it. Collected oil could then be pumped out of the structure.

 

Prentice Danner, a spokesman for the US coast guard, said that option will take between two to four weeks, and is so far an untested one.

 

A more sustainable plan to stem the oil flow - drilling a relief well to take the pressure off the initial one - is due to commence on Thursday, but BP has said that effort could take up to three months to complete.

 

[dennis tooth]

BP oil spill disaster: The end of life as we know it in the Gulf of Mexico

 

Even if the well that is spewing crude recklessly into the Gulf of Mexico were capped tomorrow, the damage is already done. Hundreds of thousands of animals are going to die. The fishing industry will be devastated for a generation.

 

However, this underwater funnel of oil is not going to stop tomorrow. NBC news reports that BP suspects it may go on for months. At the current rate of 200,000 gallons a day, this catastrophe is immeasurable. No one has ever seen anything like it.

 

Much of what we have come to depend on the Gulf of Mexico for is not likely to recover in our lifetime.

 

It has been a generation since the Exxon Valdez accident poisoned the pristine shores of Prince William Sound in 1989. “A team of scientists at the University of North Carolina found that the effects are lasting far longer than expected.The team estimates some shoreline Arctic habitats may take up to 30 years to recover.”

 

As the oil slick moves closer to shore, we will begin to see pictures of what the Deepwater Horizon explosion has done to our world. Sludge covered birds will die before our eyes as they gasp for breath under layers of black goo. The corpses of fish, dolphins, whales and other wildlife will line our shores and beaches.

 

These images will travel throughout the world and become part of our global history. This is what our quest for crude will show us in the days ahead.

 

For all the power the United States has, she is weak against this foe. We are just waiting for the pictures to prove it.

[Travis Bickle]

shiiiiiiiiiit. diesel price is going to rocket!

[Guest davelfc]

It was always going to be a close one between the oil hitting the coastline and the cost of this hitting the fuel prices.

[dennis tooth]

Why it doesn’t matter that there’s ‘plenty of oil left’

 

 

http://www.newshoggers.com/blog/2010/04/peak-oil-its-a-secret.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Newshog+%28NewsHog%29

 

" On March 30-31, the biennial International Energy Forum (IEF) summit took place in Cancun. Attendees at the world's largest energy forum included ministers from 64 countries, members of the IEA and OPEC, and other dignitaries.

 

In parallel, Cancun also hosted the International Energy Business Forum, attended by some 36 companies including the top executives of China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell.

 

In short, the twin conferences were a Very Big Deal.

 

But when I searched Google News for stories containing the exact phrase "International Energy Forum" and published during the conference, it wasn't until the seventh page of results that I found any stories from major American media outlets, and those stories were strictly focused on specific issues like oil and gas prices. They said not a word about peak oil.

 

A journalist from the oil and gas media organization Platts explained what happened on his blog. All media were barred from the IEF conference room, and exiled to a press room where the presentations were shown on monitors with no sound. When reporters asked for sound, the monitors were turned off. All sessions were then declared to be private, and the reporters that had come from around the globe to cover the conference were simply shut out.[bold Mine]

By any measure, March was a watershed month for the truth about peak oil.

 

Estimates on the timing of the peak have narrowed dramatically, and now center on the 2012-2015 time frame. The range of estimates on the peak rate of production remain a bit broader and shrouded in caveats, but they are rapidly drawing closer to 90 mbpd. And the globally averaged, post-peak annual decline rates are settling in around 2%.

 

In other words, industry and governments appear to be coming around to what my call has been all along: 2012, at 90 mbpd or less, then declining at about 2.5% per year.

 

Now we know that the oil and gas industry, as well as the world's governments, are not only aware of the peak oil threat... they too are deeply worried about it.

 

Worried enough to huddle behind closed doors, away from the press. Worried enough to formulate plans to control price volatility. Worried enough to agitate for more transparent data. Worried enough to begin planning for a future of relentlessly declining energy.

 

But not worried enough to tell the American people the truth... not just yet."

 

 

Growth Feasibility

 

Growth is only possible when energy flow is increasing.

 

It is pretty simple really. When energy flow is increasing in each subsequent time period it is possible to increase the amount of work devoted to increasing the asset base of society. Alternatively, if the energy flow is decreasing...

 

Short of a miracle (let's pray for it!) energy flows are about to decline in a serious way. And as a result growth is an utterly fatuous notion. Unfortunately, the majority of the population, and especially the economists and politicians, don't get it. The economists still firmly believe that if energy costs (oil, coal, etc.) rise as a result of constraints on production then we will simply substitute other sources (wind, solar PV, etc.) and keep going as we have been for the last two hundred years. This is both stupid and foolish. It is a complete failure of intelligence and wisdom.

 

Over the next several decades we (humans) will have to change our understanding of what is feasible and what we need to be doing to have a future. The future does not include growth of the GDP or profits. Capitalism as it has been practiced in the 20th century and now hanging on in the early 21st century is dead. Or rather, at this juncture in history, it is moribund. It served its purpose to raise mankind's understanding of what is possible in this world. It was a necessary step in the evolution of knowledge but its time has come and gone.

Real Profits

 

As growth depends on the continual increase in energy flows, more energy available to do useful work, so profits depend on more net energy available per unit of time, the energy that is left over after accounting for the energy needed to acquire energy.

 

We need to look more closely at the uses of energy in the economy. My energy mentor, Charlie Hall et al, produced a simple but complete model of energy flows in the world economy that does a good job of summarizing the situation [1, 2]. It starts with an investment of energy to obtain more energy. This is the energy used to build and operate energy extraction, capture, conversion, and distribution infrastructure. When all is well, the amount of usable energy returned from this investment is many times larger than the energy invested. Or, there is a net energy profit. That profit is then what is available to the rest of the economy to drive the activities of several major sectors. The first major use of energy profit is to maintain the existing asset base. Assets tend to wear out with use and time. The Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to the structures of material goods that we use. So a substantial fraction of the energy flow is directed at work processes that repair or replace these assets. Many kinds of intangible assets, e.g. intellectual properties, also need on-going maintenance work.

 

The maintenance of assets is the minimal level of work and requisite energy flow in the economy. So these two uses of energy profit, reinvestment in energy capture to keep the energy flowing, and maintenance of the rest of the asset base or capital, constitute the minimum economic activities needed to maintain a steady-state condition in which energy flows at a constant rate and assets are maintained at a constant level.

 

Historically, humans have discovered and exploited methods of energy capture that have far exceeded the minimum profit needed to just maintain the social economy. Agriculture, exploitation of wind and hydro power, and later fossil fuels, have all allowed humans to generate huge energy profits from nominal investments. Under these circumstances there has always been considerably more available energy for human purposes than could actually be used. This led to the development of two additional uses of energy profits. The first is growth of the economy itself. This first, and foremost, means growth of the population (human bodies are a material asset in the strict sense of the term). But it also means growth and development of all other kinds of assets, both those needed to directly support the culture and those that extend the culture (new kinds of products, services, and arts). The measure of an economy's size is the population plus the asset base, measured in embodied energy units. Once money was invented as a convenient way to represent work, both potential future and past accomplished, assets, at least, could be monetized and the size of the monetary pool could be used to measure the economy size, or at least be a reasonable surrogate measure.

 

One way of slicing the excess energy available (above that needed for just maintenance) is between necessary and discretionary asset production. Necessary assets are those deemed needed to maintain a given quality of culture. For example building more homes of comparable size to meet the needs of an increasing population would be in this category. Discretionary energy expenditures would include things like building much larger houses than strictly needed to maintain the cultural milieu. Discretionary spending of energy might satisfy egos and desires, but is not, strictly speaking, needed to maintain a given level of affluence. What it is needed for is the evolution of culture. And arguably, a major part of the human condition is involved in the co-evolution of the species and the culture. So from that standpoint it is pointless to denigrate what might now seem to us as excesses of the past. In a real sense these were necessary to promote the evolution of knowledge and understanding. But, all stories of expansion and development do come to an end eventually.

The Energy Budget

 

Energy flows through the economy (all sectors) have to be budgeted in order to assure the proper balance of energy inputs to the various subsystems. Figure 1 shows this budget roughly. Of especial importance is the feedback of usable energy to the energy capture and conversion capital for maintenance (top white arrow). This is what keeps the usable energy flow into the whole economy up to demand.[/quoteIT]

Figure 1. The energy budget for the economy consists of various flows of usable energy into investments in maintenance and growth. Not shown is the waste heat output from each energy conversion process. After Hall, et al, the "Cheese slicer" model in reference [1].

 

 

An Uncomfortable Conclusion

 

The conclusion is not comfortable but is imperative. Capitalism, as it has been practiced in a market and democratic governance system, is going to die. It will die in one of two ways. Either people will start to exercise some rationality and some wisdom and realize that as the energy supplies diminish the capacity to do useful work also diminishes. They will then seek to reorganize our governance structures/institutions in such a way as to rationally respond to the reality. Somehow I have a hard time seeing this kind of response. From outright denial, to outright insistence on exceptionalism and blind faith in market mechanisms, I suspect that most people will be blind-sided by reality.

 

This leads to the alternate more likely response. People will demand, and politicians will give them, continued support for direction of the energy budget into growth and discretionary asset production as long as they possibly can. For all practical purposes this is exactly what we already see. Think about the state of critical infrastructure in the US. Some of it is falling apart from neglect. Some of it is decaying due to inattention and restriction of energy flows into work to manage it properly. What are the outward signs of this neglect? Aversion to taxes and regulations is an obvious example. The attitudes of libertarians (regardless of political party) is a prime example of psychological resistance to grasping the true nature of what is happening to human economies. Additional examples of the political aversion can be seen in Obama's reliance for economic advice from the very architects of the destruction of financial regulations designed to prevent some of the kinds of bubbles that have arisen in the banking and stock market sectors. I must be frank. I am not hopeful for rationality and wisdom to prevail in the near future.

 

We (Homo sapiens) may be lucky enough that after the SHTF due to mismanagement of the economic energy budget, there may be a spark of rationality and wisdom available and recognized that we can turn to in our despair. Unfortunately even this possibility is highly problematic. More likely mankind will be subjected to a mean and uncaring dictatorial hand, a person or persons not eusapient, but harsh and vindictive. After all, the stock from which to choose potential candidates for leadership is composed largely of minimally sapient beings to begin with. Evolution help us.

 

For readers interested in an alternative view to the prevailing beliefs you may want to read my series on Sapient Governance here.

 

Many thanks to Charlie Hall and his associates for so many good insights into the nature of our predicament. I treasure the time I spent with him at SUNY-ESF.

[Section_31]

I reckon it's Obama trying to push his green agenda.

[kelster]

BP should be absolutely hammered for this one. Apart from paying for the cleanup, they should get a stupidly large fine as well as the jailing of executives to send a message.

[dennis tooth]

WASHINGTON – The oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico has grown tremendously in just a day or so.

 

Satellite images analyzed by the University of Miami show the spill has expanded from the size of Rhode Island to something closer to the size of Puerto Rico, close to tripling.

 

Hans Graber, executive director of the university's Center for Southeastern Tropical Advanced Remote Sensing, said Saturday that the spill is moving faster and expanding much quicker than estimated.

 

Graber says the size of the slick was about 1,150 square miles on Thursday. By the end of Friday, he says it had tripled to about 3,850 square miles.

 

Graber says estimates of only 1,000 barrels spilling a day seem to be more public relations than anything accurate.

[dennis tooth]

This will finish us off, it gets worse.

 

 

Fire on the Bayou: Non-Stop River of Oil Heads to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida

 

by Bill Quigley

 

The Coast Guard estimates 5000 barrels of crude oil a day, 210,000 gallons a day, are pouring out of a damaged British Petroleum (BP) well in the Gulf of Mexico since the April 20 Deepwater Horizon rig explosion. Eleven people died in the explosion. The oil rig burned and sank. The exploratory well, which is 50 miles away from the coast, continues to powerfully disgorge oil from the bottom of the 5000 feet deep surface of the Gulf.

 

Oil has now reached the Louisiana coast. The Associated Press (AP) reported there is an oil slick 130 miles long and 70 miles wide in the Gulf of Mexico. Birds covered in thick black oil have already been recovered. Efforts to stop the oil have not proven effective. The AP reports the oil is expected to reach Mississippi on Saturday, Alabama in two days and Florida in three.

 

Late Friday afternoon, the Mobile Press Register reported a confidential government report prepared by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Emergency Ops concluded that if the pipe on the Gulf floor “deteriorates further, the flow could become unchecked resulting in a release volume an order of magnitude higher than previously thought.” An uncontrolled release of oil “could become an unchecked gusher shooting millions of gallons of oil per day into the Gulf.”

 

Plans to set parts of the Gulf on fire have been pushed back by bad weather. The unprecedented idea was to burn up the oil spill before it reached land. “This is a great tool,” promised a BP representative.

 

In response, one long-time Louisiana resident said, “You know you’re in very serious trouble when the solution is for BP and the feds to set the Gulf on fire.”

 

Worst hit in Louisiana are the coastal areas of Plaquemines and St. Bernard Parishes – just now limping back from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

 

On Friday afternoon, federal and state officials held a joint press conference in Louisiana. Curiously, they held their conference with BP representatives. Officials characterized the situation as dangerous and unprecedented. Government representatives said they were pushing BP to increase its efforts to stop the oil because current efforts have not been effective. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano flatly acknowledged that the U.S. is working closely with BP.

 

BP has caused a lot of trouble lately. The Pulitzer Prize winning news site Pro Publica reported BP “has found itself at the center of several of the nation’s worst oil and gas-related disasters in recent years.” BP recently plead guilty to federal felony charges related to a massive explosion in Texas where investigators found ignored safety rules and a disabled warning system. BP is also accused of responsibility for several recent spills in Alaska.

 

Why then would federal and state officials hold a joint press conference with BP, given the multinational corporation’s role in the unfolding disaster? Perhaps the reason was hinted at by a comment from the Secretary of the Interior in which he cautioned that the U.S. depends heavily on oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico. Even though the White House protested that the oil spill is not President Obama’s Katrina, a public partnership between the perpetrator BP and the government certainly has the potential to become a “Katrina moment.”

 

Louisiana is trying to deploy 6000 members of the National Guard. Air Force planes have been called in to spray chemicals on the oil. National Guard soldiers in Louisiana are currently “engaged in the planning of the effort to evacuate and provide security and clean up for the coastal communities expected to be impacted by the spill.” They are also planning for the protection of medical facilities, fuel distribution, interstate highways, and power facilities.

 

Louisiana has already started setting up its shelter program for people with special needs who may have to be evacuated because of concerns about air quality.

 

Official states of emergency have already been declared along the coasts in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

 

Along the Louisiana coast, people fear the loss of the fishing industry. In New Orleans people worry about air quality.

 

Thousands of pelicans, herons, egrets, ibis, frigate birds, and rarities like grebes and albatrosses are at risk from the river of oil. Dolphins are birthing at this time so their offspring are at risk. Shrimp and oyster fishing grounds are being closed.

 

Air quality for humans is another serious issue. The New Orleans area, home to hundreds of thousands, has already been blanketed by a chemical odor.

 

The head of the Louisiana State Health Department Jimmy Guidry said the smell is an irritant, affecting people with lung conditions and asthma. He said it is normal for the smell to arrive before air quality checks could detect anything harmful. Officials with the Louisiana Health and Hospitals and Environmental Quality said changes in air quality can cause nausea, vomiting or headaches for people who are sensitive. Air sampling was started by the Environmental Protection Agency Thursday and water sampling started Friday. No reports have been made public so far.

 

Governor Jindal has asked that the feds declare a commercial fisheries failure for Louisiana. The state supplies about one-third of the seafood harvested in the lower 48 states – about $2.85 billion worth a year. Louisiana has put price gouging laws into effect forbidding the raising of prices on gasoline, petroleum products, hotels, motels, and retailers.

 

Jindal told the press Thursday that he has asked several times for a detailed plan of how Coast Guard plans to handle the situation, but he has “not seen a quantifiable plan.”

 

In an ominous note, lawmakers, according to USA Today, say they have been told that not only is light crude headed towards the coast, but so too is heavy asphaltic oil.

 

“This isn’t a spill. This isn’t a storage tank or a ship with a finite amount of oil that has boundaries. This is much, much worse,” said Kerry St. Pe, the former head of the Louisiana oil spill response team. The Gulf spill is really a river of oil flowing out of the bottom of the Gulf according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

[dennis tooth]

A grim report circulating in the Kremlin today written by Russia’s Northern Fleet is reporting that the United States has ordered a complete media blackout over North Korea’s torpedoing of the giant Deepwater Horizon oil platform owned by the World’s largest offshore drilling contractor Transocean that was built and financed by South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries Co. Ltd., that has caused great loss of life, untold billions in economic damage to the South Korean economy, and an environmental catastrophe to the United States.

 

Most important to understand about this latest attack by North Korea against its South Korean enemy is that under the existing “laws of war” it was a permissible action as they remain in a state of war against each other due to South Korea’s refusal to sign the 1953 Armistice ending the Korean War.

 

To the attack itself, these reports continue, the North Korean “cargo vessel” Dai Hong Dan believed to be staffed by 17th Sniper Corps “suicide” troops left Cuba’s Empresa Terminales Mambisas de La Habana (Port of Havana) on April 18th whereupon it “severely deviated” from its intended course for Venezuela’s Puerto Cabello bringing it to within 209 kilometers (130 miles) of the Deepwater Horizon oil platform which was located 80 kilometers (50 miles) off the coast of the US State of Louisiana where it launched an SSC Sang-o Class Mini Submarine (Yugo class) estimated to have an operational range of 321 kilometers (200 miles).

 

On the night of April 20th the North Korean Mini Submarine manned by these “suicidal” 17th Sniper Corps soldiers attacked the Deepwater Horizon with what are believed to be 2 incendiary torpedoes causing a massive explosion and resulting in 11 workers on this giant oil rig being killed outright. Barely 48 hours later, on April 22nd , this North Korean Mini Submarine committed its final atrocity by exploding itself directly beneath the Deepwater Horizon causing this $1 Billion oil rig to sink beneath the seas and marking 2010’s celebration of Earth Day with one of the largest environmental catastrophes our World has ever seen.

 

To the reason for North Korea attacking the Deepwater Horizon, these reports say, was to present US President Obama with an “impossible dilemma” prior to the opening of the United Nations Review Conference of the Parties to the Treat on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) set to begin May 3rd in New York.

 

This “impossible dilemma” facing Obama is indeed real as the decision he is faced with is either to allow the continuation of this massive oil leak catastrophe to continue for months, or immediately stop it by the only known and proven means possible, the detonation of a thermonuclear device.

 

Russian Navy atomic experts in these reports state that should Obama choose the “nuclear option” the most viable weapon at his disposal is the United States B83 (Mk-83) strategic thermonuclear bomb having a variable yield (Low Kiloton Range to 1,200 Kilotons) which with its 12 foot length and 18 inch diameter, and weighing just over 2,400 pounds, is readily able to be deployed and detonated by a remote controlled mini-sub.

 

Should Obama choose the “nuclear option” it appears that he would be supported by the International Court of Justice who on July 8, 1996 issued an advisory opinion on the use of nuclear weapons stating that they could not conclude definitively on these weapons use in “extreme circumstances” or “self defense”.

 

On the other hand, if Obama chooses the “nuclear option” it would leave the UN’s nuclear conference in shambles with every Nation in the World having oil rigs off their coasts demanding an equal right to atomic weapons to protect their environment from catastrophes too, including Iran.

 

To whatever decision Obama makes it remains a fact that with each passing hour this environmental catastrophe grows worse. And even though Obama has ordered military SWAT teams to protect other oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico from any further attack, and further ordered that all drilling in the Gulf of Mexico be immediately stopped, this massive oil spill has already reached the shores of America and with high waves and more bad weather forecast the likelihood of it being stopped from destroying thousands of miles of US coastland and wildlife appears unstoppable.

 

And not just to the environmental catastrophe that is unfolding the only devastation to be wrecked upon the United States and South Korea by this North Korean attack as the economic liabilities associated with this disaster are estimated by these Russian reports to be between $500 Billion to $1.5 Trillion, and which only a declaration of this disaster being an “act of war” would free some the World’s largest corporations from bankruptcy.

 

Important to note too in all of these events was that this was the second attack by North Korea on its South Korean enemy, and US ally, in a month as we had reported on in our March 28th report titled “Obama Orders ‘Immediate Stand-down’ After Deadly North Korean Attack” and which to date neither the Americans or South Korea have retaliated for and giving one senior North Korean party leader the courage to openly state that the North Korean military took “gratifying revenge” on South Korea.

 

And for those believing that things couldn’t get worse, they couldn’t be more mistaken as new reports coming from Japanese military sources are stating that North Korea is preparing for new launches of its 1,300 kilometer (807 miles) intermediate range ballistic “Rodong” missile which Russian Space Forces experts state is able to “deploy and detonate” an atomic electromagnetic pulse (EMP) device, and which if detonated high in the atmosphere could effectively destroy the American economy for years, if not decades, to come.

[Funkasy]

So is there no way to stop this mess ? or do they just wait until it runs dry of every drop ?

[Ezekiel 25:17]

Those fuckin' Guidos.

[Funkasy]

Those fuckin' Guidos.

 

 

give me a hug.

[Xherdan]

I fucking knew those Koreans were responsible.

[dennis tooth]

President Obama is flying out to the Gulf of Mexico coast as the emergency grows post the "Deepwater Horizon" catastrophe. The problem with the dirty "black gold" oil spill is that it is not a spill: it is an abundant flow, like an underwater oil volcano. A hot column of oil and gas is continuously jetting into freezing dark waters 5,000 feet below, where the pressure nears 2,200 pounds per square inch, making it extremely difficult to send down divers to carry out repairs manually. Experts are now calling it a continuous, 24/7 round-the-clock calamity. Unlike a leaking oil tanker, this emergency situation's source will not empty itself in hours or days. As a result, the "black gold" slick is spreading towards the four US states of Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida, that have all declared a state of emergency.

 

Poseidon's Rage

 

Poseidon, the God of the Sea, is clearly upset. The slick has tripled in size in a day and now covers nearly 4,000 square miles, an area the size of a small country. That suggests the oil has started spilling from the well more quickly. 5,000 barrels or 200,000 gallons of oil are gushing into the ocean every single day since the explosion on April 20th killed 11 men. This threatens all marine life in the surrounding area, wildlife in the marshlands, and the entire fragile and interlinked environmental web. The ruptured well, located in ocean water nearly a mile deep, has churned out an estimated 2 million gallons of oil to date into the Gulf. Some experts studying satellite images suggest that the figure is four to five times higher than that already. With no immediate solution to the leak available, it is possible that the oil well could keep churning out the same amount of oil or more for a few months yet. The commandant of the US Coast Guard, Admiral Thad Allen, has said it's impossible to give an exact estimate of how much oil is leaking. He has now been officially designated national incident commander for the uncontrolled oil release accident and reports directly to the US president, and the secretaries of Homeland Security and Defense.

 

Damage, Ownership and Responsibility

 

BP's "Deepwater Horizon" drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico sank on April 22nd after a fiery explosion two days earlier and the oil well it was connected to is still gushing crude oil. The spill and the spreading of the sheen is getting much faster and expanding quicker than was originally estimated. The damage it has done is likely to include the environment and natural habitats of several US states and BP's reputation as a company as well as its market capitalisation.

 

The cause of the explosion is still under investigation but more than two dozen lawsuits have been filed since last week blaming oil contractor Halliburton. Halliburton denies any claims that they failed to properly cap or "cement" the well.

 

The rig that suffered the catastrophic blowout was not owned by BP but by Transocean. It was leased to BP through September 2013. BP operated the rig and in the regulatory wording, is the "responsible party" for the field -- given that it owns 65% -- and that is a key factor. President Obama has said that BP is "ultimately responsible" for the cost of the spill and clean-up. With 76 vessels trying to contain the spill, BP's chief executive, Tony Hayward -- also on his way to the Gulf of Mexico -- has called the scale of the response "truly unprecedented".

 

Colossal Concerns

 

. The "Deepwater Horizon" catastrophe could soon eclipse that of the Exxon Valdez, which spilled 11 million gallons of oil off the coast of Alaska in 1989. It is considered to be one of the most devastating human-caused environmental disasters ever to occur in history.

 

. Everything about the "Deepwater Horizon" catastrophe is unprecedented. Oil disaster containment knowledge is based on a one-shot event. With this, nobody has any idea as to when it's going to stop.

 

. High seas are forecast for the near future and could push the blanket of dirty "black gold" deep into the inlets, ponds, creeks and lakes along the coastline of The Gulf of Mexico. With the wind blowing from the south, the mess is likely to reach not just Louisiana but also the coasts of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida as well.

 

. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) documents show the US government is concerned that pipes at the bottom of the Gulf could deteriorate further and the spill could turn into an unchecked gusher, an order of magnitude bigger, ie, 50,000 barrels a day. As a result, this could end up becoming 2 million gallons of crude oil gushing out each day like a river of oil.

 

. State of Alabama's governor is preparing for a worst-case scenario of 150,000 barrels, or more than 6 million gallons per day. At that rate the spill would amount to a Valdez-sized spill every two days, and the situation could last for months.

 

. The spill -- a slick more than 130 miles long and 70 miles wide and growing -- threatens hundreds of species of wildlife and sealife, from birds to marine mammals and fish: including dolphins, shrimp, oysters and crabs. This will affect the livelihoods of the Gulf's local communities, some of whom are still recovering from the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005.

 

. Experts caution that if the spill continues growing unchecked, sea currents could suck the oil sheen down past the Florida Keys and then up the Eastern Seaboard into the North Atlantic. The Florida Keys are home to the only living coral barrier reef in North America, and the third largest coral barrier reef in the world.

 

Cures (Not) Working

 

Whilst oil company workers and government employees scramble to stop the oil spill from spreading, it's clearly a complicated task. Officials have said stemming the flow of oil is their top priority, but the seas have been too rough and the winds too strong to:

 

. Burn off the oil;

. Suck it up effectively with skimmer vessels; or

. Hold it in check with the miles of inflatable booms strung along the coast.

 

Waves are going from a man's height to 8 feet high and getting bigger. The floating barriers are breaking loose in the choppy water, and waves are sending oily water lapping over them.

 

Rival Assistance

 

BP has also sought ideas from some of its rivals and is using at least one of them -- applying chemicals underwater to break up the oil before it reaches the surface. That has never before been attempted at such depths. BP and federal government authorities have said the dispersant was released overnight at the site of the leak, nearly 5,000 feet underwater, and they are evaluating the results of that effort at present.

 

Safety Record and Contingency Planning

 

What the world is learning about oil companies' emergency preparations is shocking, to say the least. Until recently it had almost been routine for oil companies and drill baby drill proponents to tout the excellent safety record of offshore drilling. The recent "Deepwater Horizon" oil disaster is changing all that very fast. Though oil rig blowout prevention has got better and better, greatly reducing the probability of a repeat of the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill, the probability is not yet zero, particularly as drilling moves into deeper waters and more difficult environments. Unfortunately for BP, its political stock in the US is not very high. It is BP's fourth major incident in the United States in as many years. In late 2009, a US government agency declared that BP still had "systemic" safety issues at Texas City, the refinery where 15 people were killed and 170 injured in 2005. Documents have also emerged showing BP downplayed the possibility of a catastrophic accident at the offshore rig that exploded. BP suggested in a 2009 exploration plan and environmental impact analysis for this specific well that an accident leading to a giant crude oil spill -- and serious damage to beaches, fish and mammals -- was unlikely, or virtually impossible.

 

Nuclear Power Option

 

Nuclear power advocates would do well to take note of how rapidly risk perception can change following a low probability high impact event such as the "Deepwater Horizon" oil disaster. When -- not if, given that the probability is not zero -- the next major accident occurs, the resulting public backlash could add further costs and delays to the expansion of nuclear power as well.

 

Conclusion

 

All commercial and leisure activity has been shut down in the Gulf of Mexico and humanity may not be able to control this leak -- the underwater oil volcano -- for several months. The designate emergency area provides a third of the US seafood. The livelihoods of tens if not hundreds of thousands of Americans are at stake. Humans have played a dangerous game with the Earth's natural resources for centuries, and in this case, Mother Nature is striking back with tremendous force.

 

"I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all." -- Ecclesiastes 9:11. Don't unforeseen occurrences befall all of us, regardless of how swift, strong, wise or skilled we believe ourselves to be?

[Arl arse]

False flag attack written all over it.

[dennis tooth]

Whats going on, car bombs, fires in the US embassy in Pakistan now this:

 

A second oil platform of British Petroleum is reported to have sunk into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico thus causing an even larger ecological disaster.

 

The BP rig went under water while being transported to a scrap warehouse nearby Morgan City in the US state of Louisiana.

 

There are no casualties in Saturday's rig incident and shipping has not been hampered in the Louisiana navigation channel. US authorities have explained that about 200 gallons of oil have spilled in the incident. A foaling barrage has already been installed to contain the slick.

 

Up to 5 000 barrels of oil a day are thought to be spilling into the water after last week's explosion on a BP-operated rig, which then sank, the BBC reported.

 

The sprawling oil slick has begun washing up on the Louisiana coast and is threatening three other states.

 

The US states of Mississippi and Alabama to join Louisiana and Florida in declaring a state of emergency and have triggered US authorities to pressure the British oil giant into taking immediate measures to tackle the oil spill.

 

Louisiana state authorities have decided to send inmates to help cleanse the Gulf of Mexico.

 

Worsening weather conditions have been hampering efforts to contain the slick, which is more than 200km long.

 

Weather forecasters predict that strong winds could push the oil into inlets, ponds and lakes in south-east Louisiana over the weekend.

 

Animal rescue groups have been receiving their first patients - seabirds coated in oil.

 

The US navy has also been deployed to help avert a looming environmental disaster.

 

The US Coast Guard reported late on Thursday that long, thin traces of crude oil were washing up on the Louisiana shoreline.

 

Thicker concentrations were a few miles offshore.

 

The US government has designated the Gulf of Mexico oil spill as an "incident of national significance". This allows it to draw on resources from across the country to deal with the leak.

[dennis tooth]

South Korea vows to retaliate over warship sinking

 

The Cheonan sank after an as yet unexplained blast on 26 March

 

 

South Korea's defence minister has said those responsible for the deaths of 46 sailors on board a warship that sank after an explosion must "pay a price".

 

Kim Tae-young promised "punitive action" against "the perpetrators who killed our soldiers."

 

He did not specify what form this could take. South Korea has not directly blamed North Korea - and Pyongyang has denied any role.

 

The Cheonan sank after a "close-range" blast that split it in two.

 

Last month, a mass funeral was held for the 46 sailors, including six whose bodies have not been recovered.

 

Aluminium fragments

 

Many South Koreans believe North Korea sank the ship, correspondents say.

 

We should deal some kind of blow against those forces which made our officers and men sacrifice their lives

Kim Tae-young

South Korean Defence Minister

 

What if North Korea was to blame?

 

 

The ship has been salvaged from the sea bed and is being examined by an international team of naval experts trying to find out what caused it to sink close to the North Korean border on 26 March.

 

The South Korean defence minister has said a torpedo strike is among the most likely causes.

 

So far the investigation team has said only that they have found evidence of an underwater explosion and it is not known whether fragments of any weapon have been discovered.

 

Mr Kim said officials were scrutinising pieces of aluminium, a key material in making a torpedo, that were picked up from the disaster area.

 

"I believe that, by thoroughly and completely getting to the bottom of the incident to the maximum extent possible, we should deal some kind of blow against those forces which made our officers and men sacrifice their lives for their country," the defence minister said on KBS television.

 

North and South Korea are still technically at war, since the 1950-53 conflict ended without a peace treaty.

 

Over the years there have been several naval clashes off the west coast of the peninsula, in the area where the Cheonan went down.

[dennis tooth]

The U.S. government believes a North Korean torpedo attack was the most likely cause of the March 26 sinking of a South Korean warship, a foreign diplomatic source in Seoul said Sunday, citing solid "circumstantial evidence."

 

The remarks come as South Koreans increasingly believe the communist North was responsible for the sinking that left 46 sailors dead.

 

A joint investigation team involving U.S. and other foreign experts has tentatively concluded that the mysterious sinking was due to a "close-range" explosion under the 1,200-ton frigate Cheonan while it was on patrol in waters off the disputed western sea border with North Korea.

 

After examining the wreckage of the ship salvaged last month, investigators indicated the ship was damaged by an explosive air bubble shockwave caused by a torpedo or a mine. But they have so far taken care not to directly accuse the North.

 

"Almost all circumstantial evidence points to a torpedo attack though there is still ambiguity that should be dealt with," the source said on condition of anonymity. "The question is who is it, but there are few candidates."

 

If there is a "strong pointer" toward 99 percent certain, the remaining 1 percent of doubt will not so be meaningful, the diplomat said, apparently rebutting the possibility of other causes such as a reef or metal fatigue.

 

U.S. Forces Korea Commander Gen. Walter Sharp will soon get a briefing on the interim results of the ongoing probe from a team of U.S. experts taking part in the investigation, said the source.

 

As for the possibility of referring the Cheonan issue to the U.N. Security Council (UNSC), the diplomat said China and Russia, North Korea's traditional allies that serve as permanent members of the council and have veto power, have to play a role.

 

"To refer the Cheonan case to the UNSC, the issue should be proved to be related to the security of the world community. I believe the first question has already been passed," said the diplomat. "Then the support of the UNSC members is crucial."

 

The council is charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the United Nations Charter, include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, international sanctions, and the authorization of military action.

 

There are 15 members of the council, consisting of five veto-wielding permanent members ― the United States, the United Kingdom, China, Russia and France ― and 10 elected non-permanent members with two-year terms.

 

Currently, experts from the U.S., U.K., Australia and Sweden are participating in the investigation of the ship sinking.

 

Seoul officials said last week that the government would give a briefing on the results to China and Russia before taking the incident to the UNSC.

 

"I think China has a strong interest in resolving this, not only because of its relations with the ROK government but also because it happened in its neighborhood," the source said, referring to the acronym of South Korea's official name, the Republic of Korea.

 

As for growing calls by conservatives here to delay the transfer of wartime operational control of South Korean troops from the U.S. military to Korean commanders in 2012, the source said the U.S. position remains unchanged, but the issue is open to discussion by both governments.

 

"There has been no official discussion yet on delaying the OPCON transfer. But the U.S. is open to listening to South Korean concerns about the transition of wartime command."

[Travis Bickle]

Sounds like the end is nigh.....

[Section_31]

I could have told them that, really. If someone said to me "Sec, we've lost a South Korean ship near North korean waters, any ideas?" I'd have said "Yes, my money is on a clandestine North Korean assault."

 

But then, that's why they pay me the big bucks.

[dennis tooth]

BP Executive: Report On Reduced Flow From Well Is Inaccurate

By Angel Gonzalez and Siobhan Hughes

Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

 

 

HOUSTON (Dow Jones)

Reports that BP PLC (BP, BP.LN) had managed to contain the flow of oil gushing from a deepwater U.S. Gulf of Mexico well were inaccurate, a BP official said late Monday.

 

 

Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer of global exploration, said during a press conference in Robert, La., that a BP employee had transmitted erroneous information about the flow at a briefing in Alabama.

 

The employee, Jeff Childs, said in an interview with a Fox Broadcasting Co. affiliate that BP activated a part of a giant piece of underwater safety equipment on Monday morning known as an annular ram. The piece, part of a failed blow-out preventer that BP has been trying to shut off since last week, clamps around the drill pipe and shuts off the flow of oil around it.

 

News Corp. (NWSA) owns Fox Broadcasting as well as Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires.

 

"The piece that he got inaccurate, unfortunately, is that it reduced the amount of oil that has been flowing," Suttles said. "That report was inaccurate."

 

Suttles said BP and the Coast Guard will make an announcement "as soon as we get the flow stopped."

 

The leak, currently estimated at 5,000 barrels of oil per day, is the result of the explosion and sinking two weeks ago of a Transocean Ltd. (RIG) drilling rig working for BP. The massive spill, estimated to be the size of Puerto Rico, now hovers very close to the coast of Louisiana, but Suttles said that respondents "have yet to have confirmed reports of oil ashore."

 

Suttles said weather over the weekend had hampered containment operations, but that the oil-skimming fleet was heading back to the site of the leak on Monday, and it is hoped that skimming operations will resume on Tuesday.

 

"The weather forecast for this week is quite good," he said.

 

The BP executive added that a dome-shaped containment system created to capture the oil before it gets to the surface and funnel it to a storage ship has been completed, and is expected to be submerged on Tuesday. The plan is for it to become operational "within a week," he said.

 

In addition, BP is also injecting dispersant directly into the source of the leak. "We expect [the process] to have a significant impact on oil reaching the surface," Suttles said. "We're looking forward to overflight data" to confirm that, he added.

 

Suttles confirmed that BP on Sunday started to drill a relief well that could block the flow of oil and gas to the leaking site, a process that could take months.

[dennis tooth]

A confidential government report on the unfolding spill disaster in the Gulf makes clear the Coast Guard now fears the well could become an unchecked gusher shooting millions of gallons of oil per day into the Gulf.

 

"The following is not public," reads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Emergency Response document dated April 28. "Two additional release points were found today in the tangled riser. If the riser pipe deteriorates further, the flow could become unchecked resulting in a release volume an order of magnitude higher than previously thought."

 

Asked Friday to comment on the document, NOAA spokesman Scott Smullen said that the additional leaks described were reported to the public late Wednesday night. Regarding the possibility of the spill becoming an order of magnitude larger, Smullen said, "I'm letting the document you have speak for itself."

 

In scientific circles, an order of magnitude means something is 10 times larger. In this case, an order of magnitude higher would mean the volume of oil coming from the well could be 10 times higher than the 5,000 barrels a day coming out now. That would mean 50,000 barrels a day, or 2.1 million gallons a day. It appears the new leaks mentioned in the Wednesday release are the leaks reported to the public late Wednesday night.

 

"There is no official change in the volume released but the USCG is no longer stating that the release rate is 1,000 barrels a day," continues the document, referred to as report No. 12. "Instead they are saying that they are preparing for a worst-case release and bringing all assets to bear."

 

The emergency document also states that the spill has grown in size so quickly that only 1 to 2 percent of it has been sprayed with dispersants.

 

The Press-Register obtained the emergency report from a government official. The White House, NOAA, the Coast Guard and BP Plc did not immediately return calls for comment made early this morning.

 

The worst-case scenario for the broken and leaking well pouring oil into the Gulf of Mexico would be the loss of the wellhead and kinked piping currently restricting the flow to 5,000 barrels -- or 210,000 gallons -- per day.

 

 

 

If the wellhead is lost, oil could leave the well at a much greater rate.

 

"Typically, a very good well in the Gulf can produce 30,000 barrels a day, but that's under control. I have no idea what an uncontrolled release could be," said Stephen Sears, chairman of the petroleum engineering department at Louisiana State University.

 

On Thursday, federal officials said they were preparing for the worst-case scenario but didn't elaborate.

 

Kinks in the piping created as the rig sank to the seafloor may be all that is preventing the Deepwater Horizon well from releasing its maximum flow. BP is now drilling a relief well as the ultimate fix. The company said Thursday that process would take up to 3 months.

 

"I'm not sure what's happening down there right now. I have heard there is a kink in what's called the riser. The riser is a long pipe that connects the wellhead to the rig. I really don't know if that kink is a big restriction. Is that really a big restriction? There could be another restriction further down," said LSU's Sears.

 

"An analogy would be if you have a kink in a garden hose. You suspect that kink is restricting the flow, but there could be another restriction or kink somewhere else closer to the faucet.

 

BP Plc executive Doug Suttles said Thursday the company was worried about "erosion" of the pipe at the wellhead.

 

Sand is an integral part of the formations that hold oil under the Gulf. That sand, carried in the oil as it shoots through the piping, is blamed for the ongoing erosion described by BP.

 

"The pipe could disintegrate. You've got sand getting into the pipe, it's eroding the pipe all the time, like a sandblaster," said Ron Gouget, a former oil spill response coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

 

"When the oil is removed normally, it comes out at a controlled rate. You can still have abrasive particles in that. Well, now, at this well, its coming out at fairly high velocity," Gouget continued. "Any erosive grains are abrading the inside of the pipe and all the steel that comes in contact with the liquid. It's essentially sanding away the pipe."

 

Gouget said the loss of a wellhead is totally unprecedented.

 

"How bad it could get from that, you will have a tremendous volume of oil that is going to be offgassing on the coast. Depending on how much wind is there, and how those gases build up, that's a significant health concern," he said.

 

The formation that was being drilled by Deepwater Horizon when it exploded and sank last week is reported to have tens of millions of barrels of oil. A barrel contains 42 gallons.

 

Smullen described the NOAA document as a regular daily briefing. "Your report makes it sound pretty dire. It's a scenario," he said, "It's a regular daily briefing sheet that considered different scenarios much like any first responder would."

[dennis tooth]

What are we dumping into the Gulf to ‘fix’ the oil spill? | Grist

[dennis tooth]

We might be powerless.

 

The oil flowing out from the seabed in the Gulf of Mexico may be under such great pressure that we do not possess technology to stop the tragedy. Chances are quite good we have no true sense of the dire nature of the situation. The facts that have been ascertained, however, lead to a dark scenario.

 

We know that the blowout preventers did not work but we do not know why. There are theories, though. The Deepwater Horizon rig was floating on pontoons about 5000 feet above the floor of the Gulf. When drillers struck an oil deposit, the bit was reported to be at about 18,000 feet, which is approximately three and a half miles beneath the platform. Does science even know what kind of pressure can be encountered at that depth, under almost a mile of water and two and half miles of rock?

 

BP and Transocean, which owns the rig, has said there was a maximum working pressure of 20,000 PSI but the system was able to handle a kickback pressure from gasses of about 60,000 PSI. The breakdown of the blowout preventers can be interpreted to mean the pressure coming up from the hole exceeded 60,000 PSI. Generally, various mixtures of mud circulate up and down the drill pipe to act as lubricants and equalize pressures encountered at great depth, and this process was said to be working at the time of the accident. Does this mean it's possible, even likely, that the Deepwater Horizon encountered pressures current technology are not equipped to handle?

 

Although BP and Washington are trying very hard to convince the public that everything possible is being done to stem the flow of crude, there is seemingly little that might be accomplished. 5000 feet below the surface of the water with oil blasting out at tens of thousands of PSI, and wreckage from the giant rig scattered about, fixes are not easy to find. The latest plan is for a special funnel to be placed over the spout, which will then force the flow into a pumping channel. But how does a funnel get placed over the top of anything pushing at that kind of pressure? Consider that story to be an unrealistic solution.

 

A well blowout in 1979 offers a bit of context; except the Deepwater Horizon horror show is already about to transcend what happened in the Bay of Campeche off the coast of Mexico. The Ixtoc 1 rig blew and began to spew crude that flowed uninterrupted for nine months. Before the well was capped, 3,000,000 barrels of crude had drifted north to Texas and the northern coast of Mexico. The endangered Kemps-Ridley turtle, which nests along the border beaches, had to be airlifted to safety and has only begun in recent years to recover in population.

 

The Ixtoc disaster, however, is spit in the ocean compared to the British Petroleum apocalypse. If estimates are correct and the current blowout is putting 200,000 barrels of crude per day into the waters of the Gulf, the Deepwater incident, after less than three weeks, will soon eclipse the amount of pollution caused by the Ixtoc during nine months. Ixtoc's blowout was not capped until two relief wells were drilled and completed at the end of those nine months, and regardless of optimistic scenarios from the federal government or BP, relieving the pressure on the current flow is probably the only way to stop the polluting release of oil. The only way to relieve that pressure is with additional wells. No one is going to honestly say how much time is needed to drill such wells but consider the scope of environmental damage we are confronting if it requires at least as long as Ixtoc? Nine months of 200,000 barrels of crude per day ought to turn the Gulf of Mexico into a lifeless spill pond and set toxins on currents that will carry them to deadly business around the globe.

 

And there are no guarantees relief wells are the fix. What do we do, in that case? Humans cannot function at 5000 feet of ocean depth and the mitigation efforts currently are being handled by robotic remotes. What is left to us as a solution other than an explosive device, which is often what is deployed during above ground blowouts. Given the pressures reported and the amount of flow, we may need a bunker-buster nuke to be placed over the wellhead. We can then begin to talk about the water pressures caused by burst at detonation and residual radiation. Is that a better or worse situation? Certainly, aquatic life in the Gulf of Mexico is doomed unless there is a reclusive genius to step forward and save us from our great failure.

 

The attorney general of Texas, Greg Abbot, informed reporters that it appears Texas will escape harm. Abbot's visionary powers must exceed his legal skills since there is no way to know when and even if the well will ever be capped. In fact, if there is no plug placed in the hole, it is not inconceivable that no part of the planet's oceans will escape harm. According to the non-profit, non-partisan, Air and Waste Management Association, a quart of crude oil will make 150,000 gallons of water toxic to aquatic life. BP, which has been marketing itself as an energy company "beyond petroleum," is setting loose upon the planet what is quickly turning into humankind's worst environmental disaster.

 

Tone-deaf politicians, especially from Texas, are trying to manage public fears, which is exactly what the state's former governor attempted in 1979. Bill Clements, who was one of the founders of SEDCO and owned the Ixtoc platform, originally described concerns as "much ado about nothing." As oil moved toward the pristine beaches of the Padre Island National Seashore, his advice was to "pray for a hurricane." I confronted Clements on his lack of concern and he stuck his finger in my chest and told me the state was not hurt. Thirty years later the tar balls still roll in with shifts of tide and wind and oil was everywhere on the beach for years.

 

Anyone who thinks this tragedy is not going to result in massive kills of marine life is either blind, ignorant, or in denial. The one scenario that we all refuse to confront is the possibility that it is beyond our capabilities to stop this undersea blast of oil. If that is the case, the flow continues until the pressure eases, which might be years. How much ecological injury will that cause our planet?

 

Nobody knows.

 

Also at MooreThink.com