Oil Spill Now Covering More Than 1,800 Square Miles

**Prince** · 04-26-2010, 01:35 PM

Oil Spill Now Covering More Than 1,800 Square Miles

By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON and LESLIE KAUFMAN

NEW ORLEANS — Coast Guard officials said Monday afternoon that the oil spill near Louisiana is now covering more than 1,800 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico, and they have been unable to engage a mechanism that could shut off the well thousands of feet below the water’s surface.

Multimedia

Graphic
Oil Spill Spreads in Gulf of Mexico

The response team is trying three tacks to address a spill that was instigated by an explosion on an oil rig last week: one that could stop the leaks within hours, one that would take months and one that would not stop the leaks but would capture the oil and deliver it to the surface while permanent measures are pursued.

On Sunday morning, officials began using remote-controlled vehicles to try to activate the blowout preventer, a 450-ton valve sitting at the wellhead, 5,000 feet below the ocean’s surface. The blowout preventer can seal off the well, and is designed to do just that to prevent sudden pressure releases that possibly led to the first explosion on the oil rig on Tuesday night.

If successful, engaging the blowout preventer could seal the well Monday or Tuesday.

The flow of oil from the leaks is about 42,000 gallons of oil a day.
The Coast Guard also said in a statement Monday that an aircrew from the United States Fish and Wildlife Service spotted five small whales during an over-flight in the vicinity of the oil spill on Sunday.

“The unified command is monitoring the situation and is working closely with officials from Fish and Wildlife, National Marine Fisheries Service and NOAA to understand the impact the spill and response activities may have on whales and other marine wildlife in the area,” the statement said.

Officials determined through weather patterns that the sheen of oil and water would remain at least 30 miles from shore at least until Tuesday. But states along the Gulf Coast have been warned to be on alert.

The Coast Guard and other officials involved with the cleanup have scheduled a news conference for Monday afternoon.

“We have been in contact with all the coastal states,” Rear Adm. Mary E. Landry, the commander of the Eighth Coast Guard District, said at a news conference on Sunday. Emphasizing that the sheen was not estimated to hit shore anytime soon, Admiral Landry said contingency plans were being put in place.

“Everyone is forward-leaning and preparing for coastal impact,” she said.
Louisiana is erecting containment booms around sensitive coastal areas as a precautionary measure.

At the rate of 42,000 gallons of oil a day, the leak would have to continue for 262 days to match the 11-million-gallon spill from the Exxon Valdez in 1989, the worst oil spill in United States history.

The leaks were discovered Saturday in the riser, the 5,000-foot-long pipe that extended from the wellhead to the drilling platform. The riser detached from the platform after it exploded and sank, and it is now snaking up from the wellhead and back down to the sea floor. It is leaking in two places, both at the sea floor. The bends in the riser, like kinks in a garden hose, have apparently prevented a gush of oil. When the platform was on the ocean’s surface and the riser was still attached last week, oil and gas were shooting up through the riser, creating plumes of flame.

Another effort described by officials Sunday — drilling relief wells nearby — would take two to three months to stop the flow.

BP is mobilizing two rigs that could drill the relief wells, which could send heavy mud and concrete into the cavity of oil and gas that drilling apparently punctured by accident.

If the blowout preventer does not seal off the well, officials intend to place a large dome directly over the leaks to catch the oil and route it up to the surface, where it could be collected.

This has been done before, but only in shallow waters, Mr. Suttles said.
“It’s never been deployed in 5,000 feet of water,” he said. “But we have the world’s best experts working on that right now.”

Rough seas halted the cleanup efforts on Saturday and most of Sunday. But as the weather cleared Sunday afternoon, aircraft resumed dumping dispersant, or chemicals that break down the oil. By evening, 15 vessels were headed to the area to resume skimming the oil off the surface of the ocean.

The Coast Guard said 48,000 gallons of oil-water mix had been collected by Sunday.

Doug Helton, a fisheries biologist who coordinates oil spill responses for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the oil emanating from the riser was taking the shape of a giant ice cream cone as it drifted toward the surface. He said there were no reports of dead animals yet, although that was expected to change if the leaks were not sealed.
Mr. Helton added that wind data allowed officials to predict that the spill would not hit shore within three days, but that it was moving north.

“Louisiana is the closest area,” he said. “There is a potential for other Gulf states if the release continues unabated, but we have no indication in our trajectories that shorefall will happen in the next three days.”

Sea life that congregates at the surface and has no mobility of its own — like plankton and fish eggs — is the most vulnerable to the slick. A large-scale destruction of eggs could affect fish populations in the future.
Officials are monitoring the environmental effects of the spill by boat and planes.

“It will be more severe over time,” Mr. Helton said.

**SYN** · 04-26-2010, 01:57 PM

Video: That's Tariffic | The Daily Show | Comedy Central

Skip to 4:31 or watch the whole thing.

**twarrior** · 04-26-2010, 04:16 PM

Seems coincidental this would happen when:
A> The President finally agrees to open up off shore drilling in more coastal areas (Specifically Florida)
B> The oil companies recently touted how safe their drilling operations and platform safety measures were.

**min0 lee** · 04-26-2010, 04:26 PM

DOMS- answer that this would be..."light a match".

**DOMS** · 04-26-2010, 04:36 PM

Originally Posted by min0 lee

DOMS- answer that this would be..."light a match".

Hell no, I'm a capitalist at heart. Sell it to the Mexicans so that they can use it as hair gel.

Then set it on fire.

**Little Wing** · 04-26-2010, 05:35 PM

lol

**Dark Geared God** · 04-26-2010, 05:55 PM

Originally Posted by twarrior

Seems coincidental this would happen when:
A> The President finally agrees to open up off shore drilling in more coastal areas (Specifically Florida)
B> The oil companies recently touted how safe their drilling operations and platform safety measures were.

you know i was thinking the same thing..

**maniclion** · 04-26-2010, 08:00 PM

I was thinking "How much will gas prices increase now?"

**Dark Geared God** · 04-26-2010, 08:39 PM

I wonder how long it will be before the set up a 3mile island oops..the prez wants nuke power it seems everytime they don't want to do something they have an oooops moment..

**GearsMcGilf** · 04-26-2010, 08:45 PM

Originally Posted by twarrior

Seems coincidental this would happen when:
A> The President finally agrees to open up off shore drilling in more coastal areas (Specifically Florida)
B> The oil companies recently touted how safe their drilling operations and platform safety measures were.

C> Cap & Tax is also on the horizon.

Can we say inside job yet?

**SYN** · 04-27-2010, 12:35 AM

I kind of hope the world does end in 2012. It'd be better for the planet to start over again then to be completely destroyed by us.

**Little Wing** · 04-27-2010, 01:38 PM

if it's 5,000 feet down maybe we aren't supposed to be fucking with it. it's wonder god doesn't stomp us like ants more often. "oh the precious, the precious... "

**SYN** · 04-28-2010, 10:21 PM

New oil leak in area of sunken drilling rig - Yahoo! News

What the fuck was Obama thinking when he said "Yea sure lets drill for oil in the fucking ocean"

5,000 barrels a day. What the fuck.

That's not change you ass, it's a new way to lean on our crutch. Now we're spending god knows how much fucking money cleaning up that god damn mess, when we should be spending it getting the electric car out of the mind and into the real world.

**Stewart14** · 04-29-2010, 12:33 PM

Originally Posted by maniclion

I was thinking "How much will gas prices increase now?"

yup, me too. $3.07 in long island today and it goes up like 5 cents a day for the past week. WTF? The gas is already in the ground in the tanks, how the hell can they get away with raising the price of something they already paid for at a lower price? How does that work?

**SYN** · 04-29-2010, 01:30 PM

Originally Posted by Stewart14

yup, me too. $3.07 in long island today and it goes up like 5 cents a day for the past week. WTF? The gas is already in the ground in the tanks, how the hell can they get away with raising the price of something they already paid for at a lower price? How does that work?

They don't give a shit about what's fair or just, they just want more excuses to fuck us at the pump.

**Dark Geared God** · 04-30-2010, 09:17 PM

just as i though they called out a swat team to the rig...green peace, hugo chavez?

**Big Smoothy** · 04-30-2010, 09:32 PM

It's bad but could definitely get worse.

Shrimp and fish industries could be hurting for years.

The penalties and lawsuits will likely be very large.

Oh yeah, I forgot: "drill baby, drill!"

**Dark Geared God** · 04-30-2010, 10:08 PM

i'm sure its bushes fault again

**jmorrison** · 04-30-2010, 10:32 PM

Originally Posted by GearsMcGilf

C> Cap & Tax is also on the horizon.

Can we say inside job yet?

Bro you have no idea. I shouldn't even be saying this, because it would be my ass, but I work on a rig just like this one. This shit was impossible. That's why details haven't been released yet as to the cause, because it is essentially IMPOSSIBLE. The BOP (Blow Out Preventer) is specifically there to stop things like this from happening. You are talking about a multi (and I do mean multi) million dollar piece of equipment, that is larger than your house, whose sole function is to keep a blow out from occurring. There is an entire team of specialists whose only duty on the rig is to maintain this peice of equipment, and it is gone through at the end of each well.

Hundreds of wells are being drilled every single day out here in the Gulf, and have been for many many years, with NO serious misshaps. There are so many safety protocols in place that this just wasn't possible. Inside job indeed. I guarantee that this was sabotage, directly in response to Obama's relief on the drilling moratorium. Not to mention that this occured on the #1 big dawg's rig. Transocean is a class A company (no I don't work for them, they are a competitor) and that rig was a top of the line rig. This isn't some shoddily constructed mess out there, it was a super rig.

For those of you screaming to stop drilling, don't be foolish. I have noticed many of the same people on this forum tend to lash out with knee jerk reactions long without having any real knowledge, facts or pertinent information to back up the completely groundless rhetoric spewing out of their mouths. Yes, we DO need to focus on green renewable energy, but don't throw the baby out with the bath water. As of right now Oil is king. Work on the flying solar powered cars, but by God don't tear up the highways just yet.

We NEED to drill in the states. Our reliance on OPEC has crippled this country. This is an American nightmare, and most of you won't even wake up and realize it until it hits you at the pump.

OPEC stood to lose BILLIONS annually with the relief of the moratorium, and now, weeks after the Presidents announcement that we were going to drill, one of the nicest rigs in the gulf, belonging to the top drilling company in the world, suddenly explodes in a nearly impossible scenario?

You don't need to be a conspiracy theorist to read between the lines, you only need to pull your head out of your ass.

Spooky shit ladies and gents. You can look forward to this hitting directly in your pocketbooks, with the vast majority of Americans yelling to shut it down, little realizing that they are doing the damage to themselves.

**Dark Geared God** · 04-30-2010, 11:09 PM

Originally Posted by jmorrison

Bro you have no idea. I shouldn't even be saying this, because it would be my ass, but I work on a rig just like this one. This shit was impossible. That's why details haven't been released yet as to the cause, because it is essentially IMPOSSIBLE. The BOP (Blow Out Preventer) is specifically there to stop things like this from happening. You are talking about a multi (and I do mean multi) million dollar piece of equipment, that is larger than your house, whose sole function is to keep a blow out from occurring. There is an entire team of specialists whose only duty on the rig is to maintain this peice of equipment, and it is gone through at the end of each well.

Hundreds of wells are being drilled every single day out here in the Gulf, and have been for many many years, with NO serious misshaps. There are so many safety protocols in place that this just wasn't possible. Inside job indeed. I guarantee that this was sabotage, directly in response to Obama's relief on the drilling moratorium. Not to mention that this occured on the #1 big dawg's rig. Transocean is a class A company (no I don't work for them, they are a competitor) and that rig was a top of the line rig. This isn't some shoddily constructed mess out there, it was a super rig.

For those of you screaming to stop drilling, don't be foolish. I have noticed many of the same people on this forum tend to lash out with knee jerk reactions long without having any real knowledge, facts or pertinent information to back up the completely groundless rhetoric spewing out of their mouths. Yes, we DO need to focus on green renewable energy, but don't throw the baby out with the bath water. As of right now Oil is king. Work on the flying solar powered cars, but by God don't tear up the highways just yet.

We NEED to drill in the states. Our reliance on OPEC has crippled this country. This is an American nightmare, and most of you won't even wake up and realize it until it hits you at the pump.

OPEC stood to lose BILLIONS annually with the relief of the moratorium, and now, weeks after the Presidents announcement that we were going to drill, one of the nicest rigs in the gulf, belonging to the top drilling company in the world, suddenly explodes in a nearly impossible scenario?

You don't need to be a conspiracy theorist to read between the lines, you only need to pull your head out of your ass.

Spooky shit ladies and gents. You can look forward to this hitting directly in your pocketbooks, with the vast majority of Americans yelling to shut it down, little realizing that they are doing the damage to themselves.

exactly there are so many safe guadrds that something like this can't happen . on this there can't be human error becausse its take out by all the safe guards..so... who did it?

**jmorrison** · 04-30-2010, 11:23 PM

I would be blowing smoke out of my ass if I named a specific entity or person. We will probably never know, considering that all of the evidence has sank and that the rig will most likely not be recovered because it will probably be left as a man-man reef.

This is going to be horrible for America, not to mention the pure hell those boys went through before they died.

**Dark Geared God** · 04-30-2010, 11:30 PM

Originally Posted by jmorrison

I would be blowing smoke out of my ass if I named a specific entity or person. We will probably never know, considering that all of the evidence has sank and that the rig will most likely not be recovered because it will probably be left as a man-man reef.

This is going to be horrible for America, not to mention the pure hell those boys went through before they died.

your right

and also another reason not to drill..its just strange don't ya think a few day after the ok to drill..they will cover it up if its the eco nutz or china or chavez they just blame the oil rig crew

**Big Smoothy** · 05-01-2010, 03:08 AM

Originally Posted by The Situation

i'm sure its bushes fault again

If you're referring to me, Situation,

No, it's not Bush's fault nor any politicians, fault.

**theCaptn'** · 05-01-2010, 04:42 AM

lol, bubbagump is fwarked

**DOMS** · 05-01-2010, 06:46 AM

Originally Posted by jmorrison

For those of you screaming to stop drilling, don't be foolish. I have noticed many of the same people on this forum tend to lash out with knee jerk reactions long without having any real knowledge, facts or pertinent information to back up the completely groundless rhetoric spewing out of their mouths. Yes, we DO need to focus on green renewable energy, but don't throw the baby out with the bath water. As of right now Oil is king. Work on the flying solar powered cars, but by God don't tear up the highways just yet.

I'm willing to bet that every asstard that says "stop drilling!" own a gas powered car.

Take their messiah, Al Gore. He tells of the evils of gas and pollution, but he owns a mansions that uses no green technology and flies around in a private airplane.

They'll talk the talk, but they won't walk the walk.

**DOMS** · 05-01-2010, 06:49 AM

Originally Posted by jmorrison

Spooky shit ladies and gents. You can look forward to this hitting directly in your pocketbooks, with the vast majority of Americans yelling to shut it down, little realizing that they are doing the damage to themselves.

Indeed. It's the sort of industrial espionage that you usually see only in the movies.

Oh, and a quick check says the cost of an offshore rig is generally $350 million; and the rig that sunk was top of the line and cost much more.

**2tomlinson** · 05-01-2010, 07:16 AM

Originally Posted by twarrior

Seems coincidental this would happen when:
A> The President finally agrees to open up off shore drilling in more coastal areas (Specifically Florida)
B> The oil companies recently touted how safe their drilling operations and platform safety measures were.

Obama fronts a proposition that would have brought the media down on President Bush howling, kicking and screaming, not to mention O's own party. To date, Twarrior is the first to refer to Obama's recent call to open Florida waters to oil drilling as it relates to this mess. I don't believe in conspiracies. If I ever meet more than three people who can keep a secret, maybe I'll revisit the issue. But I do think the current prez is being treated like royalty when, in my opinion, he is wrongheaded on issues such as this.

**maniclion** · 05-01-2010, 04:56 PM

Originally Posted by DOMS

I'm willing to bet that every asstard that says "stop drilling!" own a gas powered car.

Take their messiah, Al Gore. He tells of the evils of gas and pollution, but he owns a mansions that uses no green technology and flies around in a private airplane.

They'll talk the talk, but they won't walk the walk.

Excuse me but....

**DOMS** · 05-01-2010, 04:58 PM

Originally Posted by maniclion

Excuse me but....

You own a purely electric car?

**Dark Geared God** · 05-01-2010, 05:00 PM

I run over them hybred car with my H2

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