Gulf Oil Slick

[Glenn]

Sneaky motherf*uckers! If I was king, BP would be liquidated, it's assets used to restore all the damages, and the people responsible would be publicly executed without a trial, warrent, or judge's signature. If a serial killer can get the chair, so should the folks who murder and destroy on such A MASSIVE SCALE.

[MsDemeanor]

Liquidating BP would destroy the British economy and wipe out a fair portion of the country's retirement funds, which would devastate even more lives. As for execution (which always wrong, IMO), I'm thrilled to live in a country where we have things like evidence and trials and juries and stuff. They don't always work, but thet beat the hell out of the alternatives.

[Glenn]

Legal proceedings? You might see a few of the big ol boys go under internal investigations, get a slap on the wrist, or maybe even a couple of months in jail. BP has to be laughing at all this. Any justice we get will be served by us the taxpayers, through higher pump prices, etc. .

[Jesse]

Yikes! I am thinking this type of leadership would be even more devastating and harmful than all of the oil spills put together!

Jesse

Originally Posted by popcorninthesofa

Sneaky motherf*uckers! If I was king, BP would be liquidated, it's assets used to restore all the damages, and the people responsible would be publicly executed without a trial, warrent, or judge's signature. If a serial killer can get the chair, so should the folks who murder and destroy on such A MASSIVE SCALE.

[AtLast]

Monday is when BP will be announcing its 2nd quarter earnings..... ought to be interesting!

Last week BP's Tony Baloney the CEO was attempting to round up new investers in the Middle East. This kind of gives me hope that BP might try to keep itself solvent which seems better in terms of it actually being in this for the long haul and making restitution.

I know, I know, I am probably being far too optimistic... Sometimes, however, I do think of what is at stake for big oil in this in terms of what BP does. This could prove to be one major blemish the industry world wide that it cannot afford.

Guess I am more of a glass half-full kind of person. Or I am really in deep denial! Just having a huge problem thinking about the people in the Gulf that really need BP to pay up.

So, do you all think we will finally get the message that alternative fuels must be developed and put the resources in this that are vitally needed?

[Glenn]

BP just signed another record contract called the Caspian Project. A panel of only 3 judges rejected Obama's 6 month moratorium of offshore drilling..

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by popcorninthesofa

BP just signed another record contract called the Caspian Project. A panel of only 3 judges rejected Obama's 6 month moratorium of offshore drilling..

As the money turns....

Last night I saw some actual scientific news about the long term effects we are looking at. What the hell is wrong with people? We should be putting billions into this research and demanding these people be part of the entire regulation processes for off-shore drilling.

My head spins when I think about the future tangle of suits that will come as the real long-term health effects of this become evident.

I also keep thinking about all the tangles of drilling pipes that are underneath the Gulf... that we really don't know about. There is so damn much we do not know that is out there after years of cover-ups.

[MsDemeanor]

The map seems to be a bit off....I wonder how old it is. Even the information in the 'found via' link says that the numbers on the map don't match to the widely reported numbers. The most glaring issue, and why I wonder when the map was created, is that the Deepwater spill has exceeded the size of Ixtoc, yet is substantially smaller on the map. Also, the Gulf War spill estimate seems high - although any 'official' estimate of a spill during a US war would, in my mind, be questionable and quite likely understated.

[Selenay]

Originally Posted by MsDemeanor

The map seems to be a bit off....I wonder how old it is. Even the information in the 'found via' link says that the numbers on the map don't match to the widely reported numbers. The most glaring issue, and why I wonder when the map was created, is that the Deepwater spill has exceeded the size of Ixtoc, yet is substantially smaller on the map. Also, the Gulf War spill estimate seems high - although any 'official' estimate of a spill during a US war would, in my mind, be questionable and quite likely understated.

The information for the iconograph comes from the ITOPF.

>ITOPF<


Yes and no, to the map being off (I'm doing further research to ensure that the statistical data on ITOPF is as accurate as people are implying it is.) because the source collects data from both published and UNpublished sources.

I know I hate wikipedia (and maybe you do, too), but this is a fairly well documented link to the largest oil spills in recent / reported history.

As for their actual numbers, the ones I have checked so far are not exorbitant, but they are the highest range of the projected spill amounts.

Comparing between measurements (metric tonne vs kg vs lb) all of their reported measurements (except the recent spill which, yeah, kind of hard to keep consistent...) is accurate to within twelve percentage points. Another possible explanation is that they have also added in a percentage for oil lost to the environment that cannot be accurately assessed. That, and there are discrepancies for almost ALL of the spills saying that the media underrepresented the oil spilled in... Well, given that we all know how much the gulf numbers have changed, I'm sure you know what I mean.

Even so; I meant the iconograph not as a factual basis for argument but more as a demonstrative comparison in scale to the disasters that have historically happened and continue to happen on a daily basis, and the issue in the gulf. I was really trying to make the point that this has happened before on smaller (though that isn't depicted on the graph) and much larger scales. . . And we don't hear about it. At all.


I'm going to continue researching the iconograph creator and the data and will keep you posted, if you'd like.

Edited to add: Oh yeah I forgot! The map's creator has an updated version of the map on his site, to reflect the increasing size of the spill, I just couldn't do a link to it at the time of my post for... some reason, I forget what, but you can check his website out.

[Gayla]

I heard something on the news on the radio on my way home tonight about potential containment by Monday. All I've been able to find about it is -

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/07/09/gul...ex.html?hpt=T1

Has anyone else heard anything about this?

[MsDemeanor]

Originally Posted by gayla

I heard something on the news on the radio on my way home tonight about potential containment by Monday. All I've been able to find about it is -

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/07/09/gul...ex.html?hpt=T1

Has anyone else heard anything about this?

MSNBC has been reporting all week that the cap is being removed and replaced by a better one this weekend. Guess I kinda assumed that all of the media had been reporting the story all week. BTW, CNN is doing a story on it right now.....



Selenay, thanks for the answers and your continued hard work researching the numbers

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by gayla

I heard something on the news on the radio on my way home tonight about potential containment by Monday. All I've been able to find about it is -

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/07/09/gul...ex.html?hpt=T1

Has anyone else heard anything about this?

Just pretty much the same. Oh, and possibly an additional tanker at the top for more oil collection with an additional pipe bring oil up to surface. Hummm.. don't know if this is one of the newly re-configured kind of tankers???

Originally Posted by MsDemeanor

MSNBC has been reporting all week that the cap is being removed and replaced by a better one this weekend. Guess I kinda assumed that all of the media had been reporting the story all week. BTW, CNN is doing a story on it right now.....


Selenay, thanks for the answers and your continued hard work researching the numbers

Yes, Thank you Seleny!

Yes, I want to be hopeful about this diffferent cap. Ugh, just when I am, a report comes along with info about everthing that could go wrong that might cause more oil (other than when the old cap is off and the new being seated) to spew. Or, things/pipes, etc. under everything exploding more and possibly making the relief wells non-functional when completed.

Touch and go....

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by popcorninthesofa

Sneaky motherf*uckers! If I was king, BP would be liquidated, it's assets used to restore all the damages, and the people responsible would be publicly executed without a trial, warrent, or judge's signature. If a serial killer can get the chair, so should the folks who murder and destroy on such A MASSIVE SCALE.

So you do not have a problem, at least in principle, with the Bush administration suspending habeus corpus, the 'enemy combatant' designation putting a person beyond either US civil law OR the Geneva conventions, black sites, extraordinary rendition or Guantanamo Bay? Because what you say above--and I understand the anger--sounds like you think precisely this kind of thing should happen to organizations like BP.

Blessedly, we (humanity) have largely given up on the Divine Right of Kings.

Cheers
Aj

[Glenn]

Yes, Aj; If I was a king..heads would be arollin over this! We are talking about millions of lives at stake. We are talking about the future of our planet, the collective destiny of life on Earth! But no.. no one seems to care, not as much as they should. If Bush was still in office America would be CRUCIFYING him. But it's OK for Obama to send troops down there to kick the media out? The Federa government is who insures these oil companies againest disasters of this magnitude and should have had better safeguards and accountability. BP and the industrial military own us, our laws. But what I am more concerned about are the methane hydrates that this drilling released,,which were slowly destroying us anyway, but they may be making it happen sooner.

[Toughy]

this video is about a month old and shows a crack in the sea bed floor close to the well head:

http://firedoglake.com/2010/06/18/br...floor-of-gulf/

[Corkey]

This isn't over by any stretch of the imagination. The scientists and engineers are going to have to find a solution.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Toughy

this video is about a month old and shows a crack in the sea bed floor close to the well head:

http://firedoglake.com/2010/06/18/br...floor-of-gulf/

Yup, and this is exactly why I so agree with Obama doing anything and everything within his power as president to halt drilling right now. Even when unemployment is what it is and the economic recovery is at a snail's pace. Not to mention the mid-term elections are around the corner and the Dems could lose control in one or both houses of Congress.

I do feel badly for lost work and wages for rig employees, but, what is down there (and top-side on every off-shore rig) needs to be looked at.

Actually, the major oil corporations are not fighting this as they know damn well that this disaster could turn their industry as they know it on its head!

As much as I am discusted by BP and other oil giants, it is going to take them to develop sound contingency plans for spills and monitor every freakin' pipe under the Gulf... and all over the world.
Governments do not have that kind of cash.

Our (the US) getting to a point in which we can tell big oil to shove it is many, many, years and alternative feuls development away...

[Toughy]

there are two kinds of wells........production wells and drilling wells.......this works the same for land or water based oil rigs.

they bring in a drilling rig and drill the hole in the ground, temporarily cap the well head and that rig is moved from over the well to some other place some where else.......no oil sucking out of the ground...that would be a drilling well. The Deep Horizon is a drilling well......there was no oil being produced from that well. The explosion that started this happened when they were temporarily capping the well so the production rig could come in.

they then bring in a new platform rig, set it above the capped well head...........uncap the well head and start sucking the oil out......that would be the production well. The Deep Horizon was not/is not a production well.

The moratorium Obama wants is ONLY on drilling rigs.....it would not in any way shape or form affect the over 3000 production wells in the Gulf. All the oil that is currently being sucked up will still be sucked up.........nobody is losing their job with a drilling moratorium.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Toughy

there are two kinds of wells........production wells and drilling wells.......this works the same for land or water based oil rigs.

they bring in a drilling rig and drill the hole in the ground, temporarily cap the well head and that rig is moved from over the well to some other place some where else.......no oil sucking out of the ground...that would be a drilling well. The Deep Horizon is a drilling well......there was no oil being produced from that well. The explosion that started this happened when they were temporarily capping the well so the production rig could come in.

they then bring in a new platform rig, set it above the capped well head...........uncap the well head and start sucking the oil out......that would be the production well. The Deep Horizon was not/is not a production well.

The moratorium Obama wants is ONLY on drilling rigs.....it would not in any way shape or form affect the over 3000 production wells in the Gulf. All the oil that is currently being sucked up will still be sucked up.........nobody is losing their job with a drilling moratorium.

Ah, Ha! Another piece of info that seems very lost with the GOP and rush! Also, am I correct in believing that many of the laid-off workers (from the wells actually under the moratorium) are getting some work in the clean-up efforts?

But, 'cept... all of the damn wells (and pipelines down under) out there worry me!