BPcopalypse Day 72 links
Jun. 30th, 2010 08:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
infrogmationTedxoilspill.com: TedX Oil Spill Expedition
Independent "week-long project to document the current situation in the Gulf of Mexico". Account richly illustrated with a wealth of photos and description.
Excerpts (hat tip to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jwz):
"Flying from the Source directly to the coastal area of eastern Alabama, the team discovered the shocking fact: the flow of oil from the Source was a constant slick all the way to the shore of Alabama. Slow and steady, a mixture of dispersant and crude oil was yards from beach lines that had people sunbathing in beach chairs. The most shocking realization was that everyone had bits and pieces of information, but really no one had any idea where it was going, when it was going to hit and who was safe. [...]
"One of the ways BP controlled the media coverage of the oil spill was booking up virtually every available seaplane hour in the Gulf coast area. Luckily, our seaplane captain Dickie was fed up with how BP was trying to control the airways. A lucky situation arose which gave this rogue pilot complete flight clearance, even to the `Source'. Dickie and his seaplane was a rare find for the Gulf Coast during this time. [...]
"When we departed the Deepwater site and Dickie communicated to the Orion (call sign "Omaha 99") our intent, the controller came back quite quickly saying, "You've created a hell of a ruckus with your flight today. We've got flights in and out of this airspace and you've been interfering with them." We got chewed out for several minutes straight. The funny thing is that we hadn't been given any advisories or instructions by the controllers the entire time we were orbiting the site. Furthermore, there were no other flights that came or left the immediate area while we were there. We'd have photographs of them if there were. Something tells me that we weren't quite welcome there and our presence was merely tolerated. [...]
"The shed was deserted. A small sign read "Come see the truth. I will take you there. Boat trips for photographers and journalists. Call Al at..." I called Al.
""I switched to the other side. I work for BP now. Sorry, I can't take you out or talk to you."
"Apparently this isn't an isolated incident. BP's buying up every boat and every boat captain they can lay their hands on. It makes our jobs a lot harder."
----
APNewsBreak: BP Giving Financial Help To Stations
My comment: This is an indication that the consumer boycott of BP brands is having an effect. Good.
Yahoo News: BP spent roughly 0% of profit on safety research
The Lens: BP bankruptcy is a real fear
----
Unfoundedly wild & pessimistic... I hope
I think we don't really need to concoct hypothetical nightmare scenarios. Properly understood, what is verifiably known to be happening IS a nightmare scenario.
"Oil rain" catastrophe scenarios have been holding traction on the internet. Most of it I've seen seem to trace back to a story of a report said to have been by Russia's Ministry of Natural Resources in May:
EU Times article: Toxic Oil Spill Rains Warned Could Destroy North America
I don't have the expertise and data to evaluate this stuff myself, but from what I can tell it's pretty dubious.
Which is not to say that certain compounds and pollutants can't evaporate and find their way into rainwater. Despite the continuing pre-industrial folk conception of rain water as being inherently clean, pollutants in rain water has been well documented for decades (example: Acid deposition in rain, fog, and mist).
More recently there have been anecdotal accounts of oily rain from Louisiana to Tampa.
Mother Jones: Cloudy With a Chance of Tarballs?
I don't know, and given the unique scale and environment of the disaster, I'm not sure anyone else knows what the secondary environmental effects are going to be either. It seems to me that BP has already disproved the old adage that oil and water can't mix; apparently put enough oil under enough pressure mixed with enough COREXIT and you can create a long term suspended mixture not seen before.
And here's an alternative nightmare for y'all:
D.K. Matai, Huffington Post: Gulf Oil Gusher: Danger of Tsunamis From Methane?
----
Kindra Arnesen video
Video from Plaquemines Parish: Kindra Arnesen: Venice Louisiana Needs to be Evacuated
Mixed with emotional personal comments, a local eye witness account of BP doing things more for PR show than to actually work to mitigate the disaster, along with multiple anecdotal accounts of health problems -- she says the fumes are so bad in lower Plaquemines that the area should be evacuated.
Independent "week-long project to document the current situation in the Gulf of Mexico". Account richly illustrated with a wealth of photos and description.
Excerpts (hat tip to
jwz):"Flying from the Source directly to the coastal area of eastern Alabama, the team discovered the shocking fact: the flow of oil from the Source was a constant slick all the way to the shore of Alabama. Slow and steady, a mixture of dispersant and crude oil was yards from beach lines that had people sunbathing in beach chairs. The most shocking realization was that everyone had bits and pieces of information, but really no one had any idea where it was going, when it was going to hit and who was safe. [...]
"One of the ways BP controlled the media coverage of the oil spill was booking up virtually every available seaplane hour in the Gulf coast area. Luckily, our seaplane captain Dickie was fed up with how BP was trying to control the airways. A lucky situation arose which gave this rogue pilot complete flight clearance, even to the `Source'. Dickie and his seaplane was a rare find for the Gulf Coast during this time. [...]
"When we departed the Deepwater site and Dickie communicated to the Orion (call sign "Omaha 99") our intent, the controller came back quite quickly saying, "You've created a hell of a ruckus with your flight today. We've got flights in and out of this airspace and you've been interfering with them." We got chewed out for several minutes straight. The funny thing is that we hadn't been given any advisories or instructions by the controllers the entire time we were orbiting the site. Furthermore, there were no other flights that came or left the immediate area while we were there. We'd have photographs of them if there were. Something tells me that we weren't quite welcome there and our presence was merely tolerated. [...]
"The shed was deserted. A small sign read "Come see the truth. I will take you there. Boat trips for photographers and journalists. Call Al at..." I called Al.
""I switched to the other side. I work for BP now. Sorry, I can't take you out or talk to you."
"Apparently this isn't an isolated incident. BP's buying up every boat and every boat captain they can lay their hands on. It makes our jobs a lot harder."
----
APNewsBreak: BP Giving Financial Help To Stations
My comment: This is an indication that the consumer boycott of BP brands is having an effect. Good.
Yahoo News: BP spent roughly 0% of profit on safety research
The Lens: BP bankruptcy is a real fear
----
Unfoundedly wild & pessimistic... I hope
I think we don't really need to concoct hypothetical nightmare scenarios. Properly understood, what is verifiably known to be happening IS a nightmare scenario.
"Oil rain" catastrophe scenarios have been holding traction on the internet. Most of it I've seen seem to trace back to a story of a report said to have been by Russia's Ministry of Natural Resources in May:
EU Times article: Toxic Oil Spill Rains Warned Could Destroy North America
I don't have the expertise and data to evaluate this stuff myself, but from what I can tell it's pretty dubious.
Which is not to say that certain compounds and pollutants can't evaporate and find their way into rainwater. Despite the continuing pre-industrial folk conception of rain water as being inherently clean, pollutants in rain water has been well documented for decades (example: Acid deposition in rain, fog, and mist).
More recently there have been anecdotal accounts of oily rain from Louisiana to Tampa.
Mother Jones: Cloudy With a Chance of Tarballs?
I don't know, and given the unique scale and environment of the disaster, I'm not sure anyone else knows what the secondary environmental effects are going to be either. It seems to me that BP has already disproved the old adage that oil and water can't mix; apparently put enough oil under enough pressure mixed with enough COREXIT and you can create a long term suspended mixture not seen before.
And here's an alternative nightmare for y'all:
D.K. Matai, Huffington Post: Gulf Oil Gusher: Danger of Tsunamis From Methane?
----
Kindra Arnesen video
Video from Plaquemines Parish: Kindra Arnesen: Venice Louisiana Needs to be Evacuated
Mixed with emotional personal comments, a local eye witness account of BP doing things more for PR show than to actually work to mitigate the disaster, along with multiple anecdotal accounts of health problems -- she says the fumes are so bad in lower Plaquemines that the area should be evacuated.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-06-30 03:50 pm (UTC)That article was referring to distributors, who may or may not also own stations. Are you aware that BP stations bear no relation, other than name, to the company that owns the well in question? They aren't even required to get their gas from BP, and usually only do so if BP is priced lowest at a given time. Any boycott is only hurting the (local) owners and employees of each store. So congratulations on that.
I've also been wondering why you have been so quiet on the federal government's role in all of this; that certainly wasn't the case after Katrina. This is certainly of a much more federal scope than a hurrican.
BP Boycott
Date: 2010-06-30 05:34 pm (UTC)I support the consumer boycott of BP. Yes, I'm aware that most BP gas stations are run by working people with no personal connection to the decisions that led to the disaster and only a light contractual arrangement with the parent company. However if it's even slightly less likely that a penny from what I'll pay for a tankful of gas will end up in the pocket of Tony Hayward and is cronies if I go to some different gas station, I'll keep avoiding BP. If you wish to suggest other strategies to achieve that end, please do.
It is also another way of the public making its feelings about BP known.
I say "Good" to that article for two reasons, both because it shows the effects are being noticed, and that the corporation is passing something down to the smaller distributors who are getting hurt more despite being further removed from blame.
I think you overstate your case a bit with "no relation" and the boycot "only hurting" the local owners and employees. Certainly from any grass roots boycott, local retailers will bear the brunt, and I do feel for them-- they are now among a frighteningly huge number of people being economically hurt by the BP Deepwater Oil disaster. But I think it is unrealistic to think this won't effect the parent corporation at all. I think the article is an indication to the contrary.
Cheers.
Federal government role
Date: 2010-06-30 06:06 pm (UTC)I find your statement "This is certainly of a much more federal scope than a hurricane" puzzling; could you please explain?
As to the response to Katrina, of course I can and have gone on at length, but to hit a major point short and sweet: If the Bush administration had simply dusted off the response plans to Betsy or Camille from the '60s and followed them, the early period of the disaster would have have been astonishingly better. Promptly sending in convoys of guardsmen, food, and medical supplies while Americans are suffering and dying from unusual severe disaster has long precedent and demonstrated effectiveness.
As to the Federal government's role in this, I'm not really sure exactly what can and should be done, beyond holding the guilty corporations responsible for the mess they create.
As far as I can tell, the Feds don't have any particular technology to stop the gusher or contain the spill that the oil companies lack.
I can envision perhaps an FDR style approach: putting factories under Federal control and ordering them to turn out boom, skimming boats, and the the like full throttle 24 hours a day. A huge Civilian Conservation Corps program, employing masses of Americans to work cleaning up and restoring the coasts and effected areas. Such things may be effective. They would also be unprecedented. And one can imagine the response from FOX News and other parts of the Republican Party.
Well, this is an unprecedented disaster and a threat to the USA of grave seriousness. What do you think the Federal government should be doing?