Massive Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill

[Broomstick]

Personally, I feel much the same way.

[The Romulan Republic]

Rush Limbaugh and company are acting like pieces of shit, as usual:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nationa ... trina.html

Rush Limbaugh, conservative pundits call Gulf Coast oil spill, 'Obama's Katrina'
BY ETHAN SACKS
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Monday, May 3rd 2010, 10:21 AM


Miller, Loeb/Getty
And in this corner... Rush Limbaugh (l.) has hit on President Obama for both taking too long to respond to the unfolding Gulf Coast environmental crisis and for shutting down offshore oil drilling.
TAKE OUR POLL
'Obama's Katrina'?
Do you think the Obama administration is handling the Gulf oil spill well?

Yes
No

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As the massive oil slick started washing up on the shores of the Gulf Coast, waves of right-wing radio criticism of the Obama administration's handling of the environmental crisis began hitting the White House.

Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh called the oil slick "Obama's Katrina."

"He's getting even with his country for all of its transgressions in the past," Limbaugh said on his Friday show. "So we got an oil slick, added benefit, now he can cancel offshore drilling."

The massive oil slick stems from an April 20 explosion that ripped through the Deepwater Horizon oil rig off the coast of Louisiana and left 11 workers missing and presumed dead. Though the rig sank two days later, oil has continued to pump from the drill head and experts are predicting that the environmental fallout will dwarf the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster that contaminated more than 200 miles of Alaskan shoreline.

The White House had announced plans to expand offshore drilling earlier in April, before the disaster, in the interest of economic growth - a concession to administration critics. But the President ordered a halt of any additional offshore drilling until a cause of the explosion was determined, a move that has made "drill, baby, drill" proponents outraged.

Radio host Mark Levin and his listeners asked why it took the President eight days from the explosion to make the announcement. "This is the first real challenge that President Obama has dealt with and he hasn't been able to handle it."

Limbaugh echoed the charge that many Democrats leveled at the then-Bush administration's slow response to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005: "The rig exploded on April 21 (sic). There was a massive explosion of an oil rig in the Gulf. The White House was strangely silent about the environmental disaster just till a few days ago."

But before anyone hands Limbaugh an honorary Greenpeace membership, the comments came one day after the firebrand suggested that the explosion could have been an inside job "by hardcore environmentalist wackos." Limbaugh added that the 5,000 barrels of oil a day reaching the shore is roughly the natural level from the seepage that leaks out of the bottom of the Gulf.

"This is always the case in Washington - that whenever something like this happens, the political speculation sets in," White House senior adviser David Axelrod told ABC News. "The truth of the matter is we had the Coast Guard on the scene almost immediately after this accident. The deputy secretary of the interior was on the ground the next day, and we've been coordinating closely with the local authorities and [BP officials] from the very beginning."

With News Wire Services

[MKSheppard]

Actually. They're right. Obama's a fucking incompetent moron.

Link

Despite plan, not a single fire boom on hand on Gulf Coast at time of oil spill
By Ben Raines
May 03, 2010, 12:09PM

If U.S. officials had followed up on a 1994 response plan for a major Gulf oil spill, it is possible that the spill could have been kept under control and far from land.

The problem: The federal government did not have a single fire boom on hand.

The "In-Situ Burn" plan produced by federal agencies in 1994 calls for responding to a major oil spill in the Gulf with the immediate use of fire booms.

But in order to conduct a successful test burn eight days after the Deepwater Horizon well began releasing massive amounts of oil into the Gulf, officials had to purchase one from a company in Illinois.

When federal officials called, Elastec/American Marine, shipped the only boom it had in stock, Jeff Bohleber, chief financial officer for Elastec, said today.

At federal officials' behest, the company began calling customers in other countries and asking if the U.S. government could borrow their fire booms for a few days, he said.

A single fire boom being towed by two boats can burn up to 1,800 barrels of oil an hour, Bohleber said. That translates to 75,000 gallons an hour, raising the possibility that the spill could have been contained at the accident scene 100 miles from shore.

"They said this was the tool of last resort. No, this is absolutely the asset of first use. Get in there and start burning oil before the spill gets out of hand," Bohleber said. "If they had six or seven of these systems in place when this happened and got out there and started burning, it would have significantly lessened the amount of oil that got loose."

In the days after the rig sank, U.S Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary Landry said the government had all the assets it needed. She did not discuss why officials waited more than a week to conduct a test burn. (Watch video footage of the test burn.)

At the time, former National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration oil spill response coordinator Ron Gouguet -- who helped craft the 1994 plan -- told the Press-Register that officials had pre-approval for burning. "The whole reason the plan was created was so we could pull the trigger right away."

Gouguet speculated that burning could have captured 95 percent of the oil as it spilled from the well.

Bohleber said that his company was bringing several fire booms from South America, and he believed the National Response Center discovered that it had one in storage.

Each boom costs a few hundred thousand dollars, Bohleber said, declining to give a specific price.

Made of flame-retardant fabric, each boom has two pumps that push water through its 500-foot length. Two boats tow the U-shaped boom through an oil slick, gathering up about 75,000 gallons of oil at a time. That oil is dragged away from the larger spill, ignited and burns within an hour, he said.

The boom can be used as long as waves are below 3 feet, Bohleber said.

"Because of the complexity of the system and the obvious longer production time to build them, the emphasis is on obtaining and gathering the systems," he said.

Bohleber said his company has conducted numerous tests with the Coast Guard since 1993, and it is now training crews on the use of the boom so workers will be ready when they arrive.

"We're arranging for six to be shipped in. We keep running into delays. Hopefully, they will be here by Wednesday to be available for use on Thursday. Bear in mind, two days ago, we thought they would be here today."

It's so fucking simple.

"This is the president. You now have authority to fly C-17s or C-5s to whatever airport in the world to pick up a fireboom we're renting for $5 million a day; and then deliver them to Louisana."

[Sky Captain]

Is there a chance that this disaster significantly increase the oil price in next few years? I mean if all new deepwater oil projects are put on hold while the cause of accident is investigated there would be less oil produced overall especially when most of major conventional oil fields are in decline/expected to soon hit the decline even a relatively minor disruption of supply can cause oil prices to go out of control.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Actually. They're right. Obama's a fucking incompetent moron.

It's so fucking simple.

"This is the president. You now have authority to fly C-17s or C-5s to whatever airport in the world to pick up a fireboom we're renting for $5 million a day; and then deliver them to Louisana."

It might not actually be that simple. Do you actually have any real life experience in dealing with matters regarding the ordering and shipping of such things? If not, then why do you think such a task is as simple as driving down to the local rent-a-car and picking something up?

[Admiral Valdemar]

Firebooms are typically 2'. Even in fairly calm conditions, the GOM will give you that and change.

Firebooms are useless. More of them adds nothing when the oil will literally flow over them, and this ignores that the slick is spreading via submarine routes anyway. If it was a surface leak, it'd be far easier.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Igniting this slick probably wouldn't do a whole hell of a lot of good, anyway; whether the surface is burning or not, more of the shit is just getting pumped out from the ocean floor, and you sure as hell can't work up top when the ocean is burning.

[Broomstick]

Is there a chance that this disaster significantly increase the oil price in next few years?

I'd call it more a certainty than a chance.

[MKSheppard]

It might not actually be that simple.

Actually yeah it is. It happens each time there's a major disaster that's big enough to affect the US or the nearby states:

In Haiti for example, between 12 January and 25 February, C-17s flew 1,817 sorties to the country; and during Katrina; they had C-17s and C-5s delivering personnel and equipment into the area just two days after Katrina hit New Orleans.

The problem is that any one time, the USAF is doing it's own thing, moving stuff around -- there's a reason the C-5 and C-17 are strategic assets -- so it takes either something big or high level intervention to reroute them.

And a rough estimate is that it's going to take a C-5 or C-17 to move a fireboom, since most of them come on reels -- which while not weighing that much -- do take up a lot of space whether laid flat or side up:

Boom Container Brochure
Boom Reel Brochure
Boom Reel on Turntable Brochure

Smallest Boom Reel that these guys offer is 87" on all dimensions.

Biggest one is roughly 157.5" Wide, 94.5" long and 106.3" high.

By comparison:

C-130:
Cargo Compartment Width (Front and Back): 123.2"
Cargo Compartment Width (Middle): 119.5"
Cargo Compartment Height: 106 to 108" (with dual rail loading or not)

C-5
Cargo Compartment Width: 228”
Cargo Compartment Height: 162”

C-17
Cargo Compartment Width: 216”
Cargo Compartment Height: 148-162”

You basically need something bigger than a C-130's cargo compartment to carry the biggest boom reels with the most length of boom on them. And a C-5 or C-17 can make the trip in basically one smash; which is important since aerial refuelling is always stretched.

[Thanas]

Shep, did you miss the part where it was mentioned that

At federal officials' behest, the company began calling customers in other countries and asking if the U.S. government could borrow their fire booms for a few days, he said.

"Because of the complexity of the system and the obvious longer production time to build them, the emphasis is on obtaining and gathering the systems," he said.

Bohleber said his company has conducted numerous tests with the Coast Guard since 1993, and it is now training crews on the use of the boom so workers will be ready when they arrive.

"We're arranging for six to be shipped in. We keep running into delays. Hopefully, they will be here by Wednesday to be available for use on Thursday. Bear in mind, two days ago, we thought they would be here today."

So apparently, it looks like there were plans, but a) either customers won't part with their booms and b) there already are plans to ship six in, but they have been delayed (for whatever reason).

[MKSheppard]

So apparently, it looks like there were plans, but a) either customers won't part with their booms and b) there already are plans to ship six in, but they have been delayed (for whatever reason).

Thanas, it's not like these are in high demand -- major spills requiring them don't happen that often.

If they won't part with their booms; offer enough money for the owners to make moneyhats with; and while negotiations are underway, get the C-5/C-17 into the air so that once negotiations bribes have been completed, they can be immediately loaded up.

[Erik von Nein]

Some likely long-term and short-term effects on the Gulf biomes:

Anatomy of an ecological catastrophe: what to expect in the Gulf

Filed under Conservation & Environment, Critters, Geology, Oil Spills by Miriam

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill continues to worsen. Choppy seas and unfavorable winds have hindered cleanup efforts, and fishing has been suspended from Lousiana to Florida. While all the news coverage mentions that this is an environmental catastrophe, few articles have gone into details on exactly what that means. Here’s a brief summary of exactly how this oil spill may affect the Gulf wildlife, recreation, and fishing industries:

Direct oiling. Obviously, spilling a whole bunch of oil means that shorelines and animals get covered in oil. This is most obvious – and poignant – in large animals that use the shoreline, such as seabirds, otters, and seals. (Tiny 8-year-old Miriam cried her eyes out at images of oil covered birds trying to clean themselves during the Exxon Valdez spill). Direct oiling can also smother bottom-dwelling invertebrates such as oysters and mussels, and cause mass dieoffs of habitat-creating plants such as marsh grasses and seaweeds (see Habitat destruction section below).

Oiled birds from Exxon Valdez spill.

Indirect effects of oiling. This is pretty much the worst possible time of year for a giant oil spill, since so many animals are on the move during spring migration, and will therefore come into contact with the oil. For example, the endangered Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle is in the midst of migrating across the Gulf, songbirds are flying back to North America from the tropics, and the poor beleaguered bluefin tuna is coming into the Gulf to spawn. While these animals may not immediately die from being coated in oil, ingesting or inhaling smaller amounts can cause also cause severe illness and death. Birds and marine mammals who ingest or inhale oil while cleaning themselves or breathing at the surface of the water experience lung, liver, and kidney damage. Similarly, fish can inhale oil while breathing though their gills, which causes organ and tissue damage.

Reproductive failure. Oil is extremely toxic to fish and invertebrate eggs & larvae. In laboratory experiments, fish embryos died when exposed to just 1 ppb of partially weathered crude oil. The good news is that complete reproductive failure is not unknown in the ocean – entire generations of birds and seals have died as a result of El Nino – and that as long as the adults survive to reproduce another year, it’s possible for the populations to recover. Unfortunately, they need a place to reproduce. Which brings us to the scariest ecological impact of an oil spill:

Habitat destruction. Many key coastal habitats are formed by plants, such as sea grasses, mangroves, and marsh grasses. These are critical for thousands of species, particularly commercial and recreational fisheries, because they provide three-dimensional structure for juvenile animals to hide from predators. Severely damaging or destroying these habitats can have effects for many years, since future generations of fish, crab, and shrimp will have no place to grow up.

Oil spill damage in the Philippines.

Long-term chronic effects. While acute exposure to oil is dramatic, the long term chronic effects can be worse. A 2003 report on the Exxon Valdez recovery found that the area actually showed long-term ecological instability. In the tidepools, the mass die-off of seaweed had left habitat open to barnacle colonization, which inhibited the recovery of seaweed, which led to another mass die-off when the seaweed that did manage to move in all died of old age at the same time. More than 10 years after the spill, black oystercatchers that foraged on oiled shores had reduced breeding and smaller eggs than animals that foraged elsewhere. The local orca pod has not recovered, which the report’s authors attribute to social instability stemming from the oil-related deaths of the pod matriarchs. For reasons that are unclear region’s herring fishery has also failed to recover. The authors note:

Oil effects also are substantial (independent of means of insulation) over the long term through interactions between natural environmental stressors and compromised health of exposed animals, through chronic toxic exposure from ingesting contaminated prey or during foraging around persistent sedimentary pools of oil, and through disruption of vital social functions (care giving or reproduction) in socially organized species.

Additional resources

* Official Gulf oil spill page from the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration
* The US Fish & Wildlife Service has a short, readable fact sheet on impacts of oil spills on wildlife (PDF).
* A vast trove of Exxon Valdez-related links from NOAA
* The Australian Maritime Safety Authority has a comprehensive oil spill website, with sections for kids and teachers.

Also:

Will the Gulf oil spill reach the East Coast?

Filed under Oil Spills by Miriam

At first glance, it seems ludicrous that an oil spill way up in the Gulf of Mexico could make it all the way around Florida to the Atlantic. Unfortunately, it’s entirely possible, thanks to the Gulf of Mexico Loop Current. The Loop Current moves southeast, meets the Florida Current, and merges into the Gulf Stream.

The Gulf of Mexico Loop Current

On Twitter, Ben Landis (@younglandis) pointed us to an ocean circulation model from North Carolina State University that predicts strong eastward transport from oil-affected regions. The black arrows represent ocean currents. When there are many arrows together, that means strong currents. (The colors in this map (zeta), is a measure of sea surface height. In this case it shows different water masses, like the warm Caribbean water and the cooler Gulf Stream).

Ocean circulation predictions from NCSU

So where is the oil spill now? Unfortunately the NOAA page is down as of 10 AM PST, but here’s where the spill was yesterday. It seems well north of the fastest-moving area of the Gulf Loop Current, but this could change as the oil spreads.

NOAA Gulf Oil Spill Prediction for May 3, 2010

For more on whether the oil will reach the Atlantic coast, see this excellent blog post from Andrew Freedman at the Washington Post.

Links have pictures, especially good are the ones from the second link.

This is a massive ecological disaster, even without it reaching the rest of the Atlantic (which it will). Bluefin tuna are unlikely to have any viable offspring this year, which means their populations are completely screwed for next fishing season in the Mediterranean. Also, because of the incredible likelihood of all those estuaries being damaged it also means fishing seasons for the entire Gulf are going to be awful or non-existent. This is going to ruin fishermen in the Gulf, which is going to mean a lot more unemployed people.

I can't imagine what's going to happen to the rest of the Atlantic along the East Coast, but it won't be pretty.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Am I the only one pissed that the TV is more concerned over an idiot's attempt at a car bomb in NYC, rather than something that is actually causing damage? BBC News at six was basically five minutes on this total non-story, then a whole twenty seconds on the slick with some passing comment on the BP plan to jury rig a fix using an untested method.

But no, TERRUHRISM!!11!! The Muslims are after us again. Awfully convenient timing to boot.

[Broomstick]

Well, I can certainly understand New York TV stations devoting some time ot the would-be bomber, as that is locally important, but yeah, what's going on in the Gulf really is more important to more people. Why did the BBC spend so much time on the NY bomber? Haven't a clue.

[KlavoHunter]

Fear not - when the oil starts hitting the coast, no amount of terrorists or American Idol will be able to drown out news of this magnitude.

Perhaps this is just the kick in the balls we need to wean us off of oil, and onto nuclear power.

[Tritonic]

Has anything like this ever happened naturally? Like if there was seismic activity that opens up a way for a pocket under pressure to get out. Even if it wasn't on the same scale, I'd think someone somewhere would have noticed oil on the sea, or maybe there could be some kind of evidence for it happening in prehistoric (this could be different from place to place) times.

Some numbers were given by the Wall Street Journal and New York Times recently:

It could be months before we know what caused the explosion and oil spill below the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon. But as we add up the economic costs and environmental damage (and mourn the 11 oil workers who died), we should also put the disaster in some perspective. <snip>

Some 62% of oil in U.S. waters is due to natural seepage from the ocean floor, putting 47 million gallons of crude oil into North American water every year. The Gulf leak is estimated to have leaked between two million and three million gallons in two weeks. <snip>

As for the environmental damage in the Gulf, much will depend on the weather that has made it more difficult to plug the leak and contain the spill before it reaches shore. The winds could push oil over the emergency containment barriers, or they could keep the oil swirling offshore, where it may sink and thus do less damage. <snip>

As for a drilling moratorium, it is no guarantee against oil spills. <snip> If we don't drill for it at home, the oil will have to arrive by tanker and barges. Tankers are responsible for more spills than offshore wells, and those spills tend to be bigger and closer to shore—which usually means more environmental harm.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 19534.html

The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is bad — no one would dispute it. But just how bad? <snip>

The ruptured well, currently pouring an estimated 210,000 gallons of oil a day into the gulf, could flow for years and still not begin to approach the 36 billion gallons of oil spilled by retreating Iraqi forces when they left Kuwait in 1991. It is not yet close to the magnitude of the Ixtoc I blowout in the Bay of Campeche in Mexico in 1979, which spilled an estimated 140 million gallons of crude before the gusher could be stopped. <snip>

No one, not even the oil industry’s most fervent apologists, is making light of this accident. The contaminated area of the gulf continues to spread, and oil has been found in some of the fragile marshes at the tip of Louisiana. The beaches and coral reefs of the Florida Keys could be hit if the slick is captured by the gulf’s clockwise loop current.

But on Monday, the wind was pushing the slick in the opposite direction, away from the current. The worst effects of the spill have yet to be felt. And if efforts to contain the oil are even partly successful and the weather cooperates, the worst could be avoided.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/us/04enviro.html

[Tritonic]

Is there a chance that this disaster significantly increase the oil price in next few years?

Although the Gulf of Mexico is a limited portion of the overall world supply, that the president has issued a moratorium on new drilling is significantly affecting futures prices, such as for the market's prediction of oil prices 8 years from now in the following example:

May 5 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil futures for delivery in 2018 surged above $100 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange this week as the BP Plc oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico threatened to cause a government halt in future drilling. <snip>

By 2016 to 2018, there could be some significant impact on the supply standpoint,” said Antoine Halff, head of energy research at Newedge USA LLC in New York, who said a moratorium on new drilling, his worst-case scenario, would cause a shortfall of 500,000 to 1 million barrels a day (up to 1% of world supply). <snip>

Crude oil for delivery in December 2018 rose to $100.38 a barrel May 3 on the Nymex, the highest settlement since Jan. 20.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-0 ... rkets.html

[Thanas]

So apparently, it looks like there were plans, but a) either customers won't part with their booms and b) there already are plans to ship six in, but they have been delayed (for whatever reason).

Thanas, it's not like these are in high demand -- major spills requiring them don't happen that often.

If they won't part with their booms; offer enough money for the owners to make moneyhats with; and while negotiations are underway, get the C-5/C-17 into the air so that once negotiations bribes have been completed, they can be immediately loaded up.

Well, to be honest, it might not be that simple. If the customers are Governments or other industrial giants, they sure as heck will not just part with their safety net just to earn some money, because the risk is just too heavy to take in case something goes wrong. This is also the reason why I think the German Navy has not offered the US the use of their special oil recovery ships.

As for the C-5 not already being there, what makes you think that transport has not already been arranged? Do you honestly think the federal agencies are too incompetent to pick up the phone and ask a large cargo-carrier to pick them up? Or send a transport plane themselves?

[[R_H]]

My dad forwarded the following to me:

This well had been giving some problems all the way down and was a big discovery. Big pressure, 16ppg+ mud weight. They ran a long string of 7"production casing - not a liner, the confusion arising from the fact that all casing strings on a floating rig are run on drill pipe and hung off on the wellhead on the sea floor, like a "liner".



They cemented this casing with lightweight cement containing nitrogen because they were having lost circulation in between the well kicking all the way down.

The calculations and the execution of this kind of a cement job are complex, in order that you neither let the well flow from too little hydrostatic pressure nor break it down and lose the fluid and cement from too much hydrostatic. But you gotta believe BP had 8 or 10 of their best double and triple checking everything.

On the outside of the top joint of casing is a seal assembly - "packoff" - that sets inside the subsea wellhead and seals. This was set and tested to 10,000 psi, OK. Remember they are doing all this from the surface 5,000 feet away. The technology is fascinating, like going to the moon or fishing out the Russian sub, or killing all the fires in Kuwait in 14 months instead of 5 years.



We never have had an accident like this before so hubris, the *folie d'grandeur, *sort of takes over. BP were the leaders in all this stretching the envelope all over the world in deep water.

This was the end of the well until testing was to begin at a later time, so a temporary "bridge plug" was run in on drill pipe to set somewhere near the top of the well below 5,000 ft. This is the second barrier, you always have to have 2, and the casing was the first one. It is not know if this was actually set or not. At the same time they took the 16+ ppg mud out of the riser and replaced it with sea water so that they could pull the riser, lay it down, and move off.

When they did this, they of course took away all the hydrostatic on the well. But this was OK, normal, since the well was plugged both on the inside with the casing and on the outside with the tested packoff. But something turned loose all of a sudden, and the conventional wisdom would be the packoff on the outside of the casing.

Gas and oil rushed up the riser; there was little wind, and a gas cloud got all over the rig. When the main inductions of the engines got a whiff, they ran away and exploded. Blew them right off the rig. This set everything on fire.



A similar explosion in the mud pit / mud pump room blew the mud pumps overboard. Another in the mud sack storage room, sited most unfortunately right next to the living quarters, took out all the interior walls where everyone was hanging out having - I am not making this up - a party to celebrate 7 years of accident free work on this rig. 7 BP bigwigs were there visiting from town.

In this sense they were lucky that the only ones lost were the 9 rig crew on the rig floor and 2 mud engineers down on the pits. The furniture and walls trapped some and broke some bones but they all managed to get in the lifeboats with assistance from the others.

The safety shut ins on the BOP were tripped but it is not clear why they did not work. This system has 4 way redundancy; 2 separate hydraulic systems and 2 separate electric systems should be able to operate any of the functions on the stack. They are tested every 14 days, all of them (there is also a stab on the stack so that an ROV can plug in and operate it, but now it is too late because things are damaged).

The well is flowing through the BOP stack, probably around the outside of the 7" casing. As reported elsewhere, none of the "rams", those being the valves that are supposed to close around the drill pipe and / or shear it right in two and seal on the open hole, are sealing. Up the riser and out some holes in it where it is kinked. A little is coming out of the drill pipe too which is sticking out of the top of the riser and laid out on the ocean floor. The volumes as reported by the media are not correct but who knows exactly how much is coming?

2 relief wells will be drilled but it will take at least 60 days to kill it that way. There is a "deep sea intervention vessel" on the way, I don't know if that means a submarine or not, one would think this is too deep for subs, and it will have special cutting tools to try to cut off the very bottom of the riser on top of the BOP. The area is remarkably free from debris.



The rig "Enterprise" is standing by with another BOP stack and a special connector to set down on top of the original one and then close.

You saw this sort of thing in Red Adair movies and in Kuwait, a new stack dangling from a crane is just dropped down on the well after all the junk is removed. But that is not 5,000 ft underwater.

One unknown is if they get a new stack on it and close it, will the bitch broach around the outside of all the casing??

In order for a disaster of this magnitude to happen, more than one thing has to go wrong, or fail. First, a shitty cement job. The wellhead packoff / seal assembly, while designed to hold the pressure, is just a backup. And finally, the ability to close the well in with the BOP somehow went away.

A bad deal for the industry, for sure. Forget about California and Florida. Normal operations in the Gulf will be overregulated like the N. Sea. And so on.

[Admiral Valdemar]

That comment was from Mad Dog on TOD.com. I remember, because I called him on his bullshit end line there about regulation (fucking regulations making European oil exploration safe!).

The rest of the story tallies with other reports. They were in the process of recovering the synth-mud when something went disastrously wrong.

I have heard BP have plugged one of the pipeline leaks, but it now seems that the flow is up to 60 kbpd and the plugging of that one leak changes nothing in the grand scheme of things. Whether the plan to dome the major outflow will work or not is entirely hypothetical. This kind of thing has never been done before.

[Phantasee]

Most common reaction that I've heard up here: "So much for "clean" oil!"

Yes. Albertans are smug about the Gulf Oil spill, as Alberta oil sands have never ruined the Louisianan coastline.

[Broomstick]

"Never been done before" - well, a lot of things have been done that had "never been done before", and we have some serious incentive to try in this case. I sure hope the planned operation(s) succeed.

[Sea Skimmer]

[quote="Admiral Valdemar"]That comment was from Mad Dog on TOD.com. I remember, because I called him on his bullshit end line there about regulation (fucking regulations making European oil exploration safe!).
[/quot

You can't deny the North Sea is overregulated in some really stupid ways. As the number one example people can't live on the production platforms after Piper Alfa, and yet this means they must constantly fly on helicopters back to shore or to other accommodations only rigs rather then just making trips every few weeks to go back home for rest. The helicopters of course routinely crash like all helicopters do. Happened at least twice in 2009 as I recall, one being lost with everyone on it. The only reason more people don't die that way is only because they keep banning smaller and smaller types of chopper from even being used, so when they do crash its simply not as many people to die. But more flights also increases the odds of crashes at the same time.

This was all and all a huge over reaction to the Alfa rig fire, which occurred only because of a long series glaring series of stupid mistakes, like using a rig built for oil to harvest natural gas in the first place, and continuing to pump fucking oil through the platform even after it blew up several times over.... Even for all that the vast majority of men would have survived except no one even issued an order to evacuate, and they had no worthwhile lifeboats. As we see in this current disaster meanwhile, the Horizon Rig had 11 people killed, but of them in close proximity to the initial blast, which nothing but 100% automation could protect against. Everyone else got off despite damage extensive enough to sink the thing.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I was thinking about that, and it is indeed a pain to the oil companies, especially smaller start-ups, when it comes down to it. The recent volcanic ash interference certainly impacted on many rigs there, since a few helos were shown to have flown right through such a cloud even at their altitude of cruising.

Still, this isn't about saving lives on rigs so much. It's about stopping the world's largest marine disaster, which clearly is only a good thing. Blow-outs and helo crashes happen, sadly, yet they are nothing on a catastrophe like this or Chernobyl, which in the end, a lot of laws try to forbid (unless you live around the Niger Delta, then you can enjoy the awesome unregulated Big Oil business all LOLbertarians envision). Badly done regulation is a more pressing concern, but I'm all for more red tape if it means far less chance of this kind of event happening. It's bad enough we get played by the double jeopardy rule in a lot of safety cases within Big Oil, or how hilariously BP got a less than $100k fine for Cherry Point and will take two decades to investigate. Really? Fucking $70k is all the US government deems suitable to fine one of the largest companies in the world for over the clusterfuck of mismanagement and loss of life that was the incident in Texas? They can blow me, as can anyone asking for less, not more regulation. Oh no, more flying to and from a rig versus killing the ocean. I wonder which is going to be more pressing (ignoring the MASSIVE economic repercussions already hitting the Gulf economy from this little slick we're having now).

As if on cue, the former president of Shell, John Hofmeister, has come out saying that peak oil and the energy concerns we're having now or soon will be, wouldn't be a problem if the nasty gubmint didn't keep poking around with regulations and safety policies.

[Sea Skimmer]

As for the C-5 not already being there, what makes you think that transport has not already been arranged? Do you honestly think the federal agencies are too incompetent to pick up the phone and ask a large cargo-carrier to pick them up? Or send a transport plane themselves?

They are EASILY that incompetent. God did you see Katrina, when FEMA decided to use hundreds upon hundreds of Ch-47 sorties to try to plug multiple 500+ yard wide levee breaks with sandbags, instead of using them to airlift everyone out of the Superdome? If someone real high up doesn't order it done, its safe to assume it wasn't because no one wants to order 300,000 dollars to be spent just to gas up a plane to send it to say England to pick up a boom, only to find they didn't have approval.