By GottaLaff
Here are some excerpts I pulled from a few L.A. Times articles covering the horrific environmental disaster that BP's "oil exploration" caused to give you an overall picture from several perspectives:
Initial estimates that it was leaking 1,000 barrels of oil a day were upped to 5,000 barrels, a rate that could make the BP spill larger than the nation's worst previous oil spill, the 1989 wreck of the tanker Exxon Valdez in Alaska's Prince William Sound.
This was an explosion, not a "spill". "Spill" has that innocent oopsie tone to it that implies a relatively quick fix. No, the problems this catastrophe caused are unprecedented:
[I]t isn't really a spill: It‘s a gush, like an underwater oil volcano. A hot column of oil and gas is spurting into freezing, black waters nearly a mile down, where the pressure nears a ton per inch, impossible for divers to endure. Experts call it a continuous, round-the-clock calamity, unlike a leaking tanker, which might empty in hours or days.
"Everything about it is unprecedented," said geochemist Christopher Reddy, an oil-spill expert and head of the Coastal Ocean Institute at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts [...] [W]e don't know when it's going to stop."
But the endless devastation isn't just environmental. No, "drill baby drill" is ruining entire businesses, and consequently, lives. It's a tragic domino effect:
As the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico continued to spread Friday, Louisiana's $2.5-billion commercial fishing industry, which provides much of the country's domestic shrimp and oysters, is bracing for a virtual shutdown that could trigger shortages and price hikes for consumers nationwide.
As an armada of fishing vessels was dodging the oil-covered waters, seafood distributors, restaurants and grocery stores across the nation were on edge as well. [...]
[P]rices could jump 10% or more if supply diminished. [...]
[T]he Gulf region accounts for about one-fifth of the total U.S. commercial production and more than three-quarters of its domestic shrimp output, according to state and federal officials. [...]
This year's crab season had been subpar. Now the oil spill.
Even the fish he was using as bait were starting to smell faintly like a leaking car.
As I mentioned yesterday, in Santa Barbara, the odor still lingers from the 1969 mess.
Perspective
Birds fly over oil on the water near Breton Sound Island on the southernmost tip of the Chandeleur Islands in the Gulf of Mexico south of Louisiana, where oil leaking from the Deepwater Horizon wellhead continues to spread.
In a previous post, I wrote about the Halliburton connection. Surprise!
Now we have more on that, too:
Of course, Cheney Inc., er, Halliburton is saying they did everything by the book. Is that the same book that should get thrown at them?
Repairing the damage from this nightmare will take decades. As for repairing Halliburton's and BP's reputations? Eons. And that's being conservative.
Please follow the links for more details.
In a previous post, I wrote about the Halliburton connection. Surprise!
Now we have more on that, too:
Investigators delving into the possible cause of the massive gulf oil spill are focusing on the role of Houston-based Halliburton Co., the giant energy services company, which was responsible for cementing the drill into place below the water. The company acknowledged Friday that it had completed the final cementing of the oil well and pipe just 20 hours before the blowout last week.
Of course, Cheney Inc., er, Halliburton is saying they did everything by the book. Is that the same book that should get thrown at them?
At the time of the accident, the Halliburton statement said, "well operations had not yet reached the point requiring the placement of the final cement plug which would enable the planned temporary abandonment of the well." Experts say cementing is a basic part of drilling, exploration and production of oil on the sea floor. [...]
According to experts cited in Friday's Wall St. Journal, the timing of last week's cement job in relation to the explosion -- only 20 hours beforehand, and the history of cement problems in other blowouts "point to it as a possible culprit."
Repairing the damage from this nightmare will take decades. As for repairing Halliburton's and BP's reputations? Eons. And that's being conservative.
Please follow the links for more details.
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