Oil Spill Blues

Carl

Carl

Well-known member
Staff member
As you can imagine, this oil spill has all of us down on the Gulf Coast worried. We could see very serious damage to coastal marshes from the mouth fo the Mississippi all the way to Panama City if they dont get this thing under control soon. Some of my favorite duck hunting & fishing spots are udner the gun, as are a lot of other in Mississippi & Louisiana.
Our Department is doing as much as we can to get prepared, we are doing pre-impact sampling and assisting with getting boom is place, but we still dont know exactly what we will see. Only time will tell...
 
I feel for you. I have been watching this oil blob in slow motion. It is excruciating. I hope they get it under control soon. This effects all of us on the east coast. Sorry.
 
At first glance I thought the media was blowing this WAY out of proportion but apparently not. Seems suspicious that at a time when our administration is bending on their stance on off shore drilling that this would happen but I guess this isn't the time to start pointing fingers.

One thing to remember is that mother nature has an amazing ability to heal herself...even when it comes to man made disasters. I hope the problems are mitigated quickly.
 
Don't worry Carl 21 years after the Exxon Valdez there is only a "minor" impact to the rich sea life of Prince William Sound. Minor according to the Exxon lawyers. Still no herring and the bios have no idea what is going on with the killer whales. On some beaches there is only 1 foot of crude left under the beach rocks. Yes you can still find raw crude oil 21 years afterward.

You are fortunate in that the spill starts well out at sea and that you are in a much warmer climate where bio-degradation will happen faster than it does up here. The spill will "clean itself up" thanks to the chop. This actually means that the crude gets turned to mouse foam and becomes less bouyant and sinks to the bottom or to a middle denser cold/saline horizon where it will keep spreading. The BP spokesmen will say that this is a good thing.

I really don't know how things will work out down there in the long run. Short run it will be really messy.....

BP will probably hire the same lawyers that Exxon used and it will take one or two generations before the lawsuites are settled. The only saving grace is the laws that changed in 1990 (thanks Exxon!) will give the government and the people more power to recover costs.
 
This one should scare everyone. When you look at the Gulf of Mexico and see the nations that border it or the islands that are within it, what lies ahead for them? With summer coming on and the prevailing winds heading north the gulf coastal states will be hammered along with Mexico.
To know that over 200,000 gallons of crude oil are being spewed into the gulf every 24 hours on a non-stop basis, where will it all end up going? Do we have the man power and the tools to combat such a wicked adversary? I hope so. When you hear things like; they just don't know why the shut off valves didn't work----it might take 45 to 90 days to drill a relief well, we are building a huge box of steel to lower over the uncapped well head but don't know if it will work----all of these tend to put one on edge.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have the other oil rigs surrounded in crude? No one has talked about that yet. Can the workers stay on them or will they be shut down because of safety hazzards? I wonder what the price of gas and diesel will be by this summer?
On going litigation will not help those people whose lives have been so drastically altered like; commercial fishing operations, charter fishing, sight seeing, tourism. Who in their right mind wants to go to an area saturated in crude---the sight of it and the smell of it, is unforgettable.
Let us hope that wise decisions will be made and the Lady Luck will be on our side. To all those individuals who will be trying to save the thousands upon thousands of birds and animals, God Bless You. To the many people who are working non-stop trying to correct this predicament that we are now in, Be Safe.
Al
 
The fact that it will continue to leak oil for several months is crushing. The fragile marsh grass will probably die. I can't express how despondent I feel right now. I keep thinking the winds will change and it will stay away from the coast. This is not happening. I got up this morning and the trees in Baton Rouge are swaying in the winds blowing from the south. This is going to be very bad before it is under control and cleaned up. The current photos are not so bad but I keep picturing in my mind an oil covered marsh and a huge fish kill. To think from LA to FL this could affect a large portion of the Gulf Coast.
 
Yep,
This could be really,really bad.The potential damage to our fragile coastlines is mindblowing and the thought of migrating birds arriving to this mess turns my stomach.11 days,still leaking and it doesn't sound like they have a clue how to stop it.
If the slick contaminates our panhandle beaches tourism will be nonexistant,not very good news considering our local economy has been circling the drain for the last 3 years.
Not being able to duck hunt this year could be the least of our problems.
 
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Who in their right mind wants to go to an area saturated in crude---the sight of it and the smell of it, is unforgettable.
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Maybe this should be a "travel excursion/fact finding mission/volunteer cleanup effort",,, required of all our congressmen and senators????
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Hey, Dave, what if all oil people had to be in that group, also? Do you think for a minute that any of them would actually say that we need to start looking for alternative energy sources?
Al
 
Terrible thing, all that devastation to wetlands and water. I hope , but don't expect them to catch the culprits. This spill is really politically charged.
 
Not to dump even more bad thoughts on this, but Hurricane Season starts in June, and I can't even imagine what kind of damage a hurricane full of crude oil could do....

Does anyone else think that it is just a bit fishy, coming less than 3 weeks after Obama announces that we should increase our drilling of these regions??
 
I hope , but don't expect them to catch the culprits.
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What does that mean?

Are you referring to the 11 presumed dead rig workers as being possible culprits that planned this and are now in hiding?

Are you referring to what that drug addict Rush alluded to a few days ago that "greenies" blew up the rig?

Blow outs happen quite often and are typically stopped without an issue. However, the geology being drilled through plays a big part and can mess things up so that the drilling fluids and back pressure make things fail. Much like what happend in 1979 down in Mexico. If there is too much back pressure from the formation there is not a valve or pump on earth that will stop it from blowing out.
 
BP, who is the "culprit" in this case, seems to be owning up to their responsibilities. Not hiding with their heads in the sand like that other big company that screwed up Alaska.
 
As I recall, at this point in the Exxon Valdez incident, Exxon's public statements were pretty much identical to what BP is saying now. In a few years--or 20--we'll know what damage was done, and whether or not BP (and other responsible parties, if any) has made appropriate amends to folks who lost their livelihoods.

For now, I want BP and everyone else focused on #1, capping or capturing the leak; and #2, containing the spilled oil away from the most sensitive coastal resources.

We're going to have decades to decide who's to blame, and that's just not important in the next few weeks. And not possible without a lot more information than is available today.
 
Carl,

Whats the latest from your area on the oil spill?

I think that BP is in a tough spot, it could be simple failure of an item that caused the explosion (complex systems can fail no matter the amount of built in safety margin), blatant negligence, or a gradient in between. I think Jeff is right, lets get it cleaned up then play the blame game....

Matt
 
As of right now, the winds and current have kept the oil offshore. The forecast is for these condition to persist, so even out to Friday, we are not predicted to get oil on our beaches. There are predictions for light oiling to reach parts of the LA coast Thurday/Friday. But the wind is supposed to shift later in the week again, and that could change things.
Class Action Suits have been filed by commericial fishermen, charterboat operators, condo associations, and others, but mainly, the States, and the population in general, are concentrating on response and preparation. There will be plenty of time for finger pointing later.

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