Louisiana Oil Rig Fire / Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill - Page 2 - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Derwood · 05-05-2010, 06:06 AM

The conservative spin machine has really gone off the rails with this.

A sampling of sound bites I've heard:

- This is Obama's Katrina (wut?)

- Environmental radicals sabotaged the pipeline to make a political stance

- Obama administration WANTED a crisis like this

- This is good for Obama because he's so anti-oil (even though he just opened off shore drilling and ran on a pro-drilling platform)

Baraka_Guru · 05-05-2010, 07:59 AM

Reading the bits coming from scientists and academics regarding the impact of the oil and the continuing problems of its still spewing into the ocean (the rate at which it spews, and how long it might take to stop it), I have a rather frightening sense that they're coming to a consensus, whether consciously or not:

This is likely become the greatest environmental disaster in American history.

We're not nearly as alarmed as we should be, probably because it's happening in slow motion.

And now for some updates, of varying significance:

Gulf of Mexico oil spill: one of three leaks capped - Telegraph

Texas Governor calls Louisiana oil spill 'act of God' - Telegraph

roachboy · 05-05-2010, 08:15 AM

more conservative spin. first a kinda hilarious argument from rick perry, governor of the backward state of texas:

Quote:

Perry: Oil spill may be 'act of God'
By: Jake Sherman
May 3, 2010 02:10 PM EDT

Texas Gov. Rick Perry Monday offered a stern warning against halting oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico in the wake of a massive oil leak, and he raised the question of whether the explosion was an “act of God.”

The Republican governor, speaking at the Chamber of Commerce in Washington, warned against a “a knee-jerk reaction” to the spill and said the government doesn’t know what caused the leak, which took 11 lives and threatens the Gulf coast’s vast fishing industry.

“We don’t know what the event that has allowed for this massive oil to be released,” Perry said alongside several other governors on a panel Monday. “And until we know that, I hope we don’t see a knee-jerk reaction across this country that says we’re going to shut down drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, because the cost to this country will be staggering.”

Perry questioned whether the spill was “just an act of God that occurred” and said that any “politically driven” decisions could put the U.S. in further economic peril.

“From time to time there are going to be things that occur that are acts of God that cannot be prevented,” Perry said.

His line of thinking offers a foil to liberal groups and lawmakers who are calling for an immediate halting in off-shore drilling, something that the Obama administration has championed. MoveOn called for President Barack Obama to reinstate the ban on off-shore drilling Monday.

Rick Perry: Oil spill may be 'act of God' - Jake Sherman - POLITICO.com

so don't "give in to a knee jerk reaction" to what is possibly the worst environmental disaster in us history and rethink the drill drill drill approach.
this is god's fault.

the national review makes a similar argument, but adds in cost-effectiveness as an extra bon-bon.

http://article.nationalreview.com/43...ng/the-editors

so yeah. the right is still on its knees in front of the oil industry.

Cimarron29414 · 05-05-2010, 09:37 AM

While it may have been an act of God which caused the spill (which is sort of a legal term for a nature event causing the damage as opposed to human error), that does not change the fact that man was entirely unprepared and sluggish in containing the damage the act of God could(will) cause - which is the egregious part. We have a moral obligation to have safety/containment measures in place for something like this. This event has certainly exposed to me the cavalier approach that man has taken in underwater drilling. I still believe that collecting this oil is necessary, but I can't believe they didn't have a system, a backup system, and a backup's backup for instantly capping a pipe at the ocean floor.

roachboy · 05-05-2010, 09:43 AM

this piece from the washington post may explain some of the specific lack of preparedness around this bp site. it was exempted from safety reviews undertaken by interior thanks to bp lobbying efforts. the safety reports that were issued presupposed that what has happened was impossible. best to look at the linked article because it contains links to supplementary materials.

washingtonpost.com

Cimarron29414 · 05-05-2010, 09:54 AM

You know, the more I think about this the more it pisses me off. If I want to move an electrical outlet in my house 1 inch to the right, I have to go get a permit. An inspector comes to my house and looks at the site and my plans. I have to have the work performed by a licensed professional. Then, the inspector returns and makes certain that the work meets regulations. That's for me, my house, my risk.

This is the fucking Gulf of Mexico. 50 million people, a trillion pieces of wildlife.

And another thing: didn't they pull 11 people of this rig? Why do we have to speculate what happened? Can't we waterboard those guys and find out?

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 10:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

this piece from the washington post may explain some of the specific lack of preparedness around this bp site. it was exempted from safety reviews undertaken by interior thanks to bp lobbying efforts. the safety reports that were issued presupposed that what has happened was impossible. best to look at the linked article because it contains links to supplementary materials.

washingtonpost.com

I have read this article, many others, I have listened to experts and those used as experts by the media. This is a complex issue and the underlying idea that BP used lobbying efforts to misdirect or to hide environmental risks of rig failure is overly simplistic. BP has no financial incentive to operate an off-shore rig with an unacceptable level of risk. This event was an accident, unforeseen and as a result the exposure to damage was under-estimated. The regulatory agency has no incentive to expose the Gulf of Mexico to catastrophic oil spills and I believe the people working there do the best they can. There are lessons to be learned here, but over-reacting and being judgmental on motives is unfortunate. It would be nice to live in a world with no risks and no accidents but we don't.

roachboy · 05-05-2010, 10:36 AM

ace---i'm busy at the moment, but have a look at the post i put up above that references a blog from mit press: there's an interesting and useful overview of the regulatory regime that frames oil drilling in general that talks specifically about the processes that are referenced again in the post article. it provides a bit of context that i found useful.

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 10:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Derwood

The conservative spin machine has really gone off the rails with this.

A sampling of sound bites I've heard:

- This is Obama's Katrina (wut?)

- Environmental radicals sabotaged the pipeline to make a political stance

- Obama administration WANTED a crisis like this

- This is good for Obama because he's so anti-oil (even though he just opened off shore drilling and ran on a pro-drilling platform)

You did not include: of the 11% who think Elvis is alive, there is a guy who voted for Nixon once who thinks Elvis was on the rig and partly to blame.

So, MSNBC interviews someone and all of a sudden that person in your mind is the "conservative spin machine". Why not call it the "MSNBC spin machine", it seems their only goal is to try and make conservatives look bad - don't you see that for what it is?

Cimarron29414 · 05-05-2010, 10:47 AM

Ace,

My point is this. It's been, what?, 14 days or so? They constructed some box with a funnel and a pipe on it to put over the hole and route the oil to a ship. Why didn't they have that built and sitting under a tarp in Mobile Alabama - ready to be shipped to the gulf on a moment's notice? Why did it take 7 days to even start to build such a safety measure? That's my problem with this whole thing - you have to figure shit like that out BEFORE you drill, not after the spill.

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 11:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cimarron29414

Ace,

My point is this. It's been, what?, 14 days or so? They constructed some box with a funnel and a pipe on it to put over the hole and route the oil to a ship. Why didn't they have that built and sitting under a tarp in Mobile Alabama - ready to be shipped to the gulf on a moment's notice? Why did it take 7 days to even start to build such a safety measure? That's my problem with this whole thing - you have to figure shit like that out BEFORE you drill, not after the spill.

Everyone agrees. With the benefit of hindsight, it is easy to say they should have had it all figured out. We are talking about relatively new techniques - I can not excuse what happened and I agree they should have planned better and used at least one more redundant fail-safe. The folks at BP are saying the same thing internally. I am simply not ready to conclude that BP has not been acting in good faith.

---------- Post added at 07:01 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:54 PM ----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

ace---i'm busy at the moment, but have a look at the post i put up above that references a blog from mit press: there's an interesting and useful overview of the regulatory regime that frames oil drilling in general that talks specifically about the processes that are referenced again in the post article. it provides a bit of context that i found useful.

I understand the context and I will add that the people actually in the business know more about the business than those charged with regulating the business. This is and will always be a fundamental weakness with regulation, hence there has to be an element of "self regulation". The key in my opinion is understanding when the incentive to do what is right is greater than the incentive to do what is wrong. Self-regulation in this regard is paramount to markets functioning efficiently. Regulators will never be able to over-see every action taken, they will always generally be reactionary. Those behind the sources you cite don't seem to acknowledge that.

Rekna · 05-05-2010, 11:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aceventura3

You did not include: of the 11% who think Elvis is alive, there is a guy who voted for Nixon once who thinks Elvis was on the rig and partly to blame.

So, MSNBC interviews someone and all of a sudden that person in your mind is the "conservative spin machine". Why not call it the "MSNBC spin machine", it seems their only goal is to try and make conservatives look bad - don't you see that for what it is?

Except the person who pushed this was former FEMA chief Michael "Heck of a Job" Brown on Fox News. Fox news didn't call him out on it. This was a clear attempt at spin endorsed by fox and friends.

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 11:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

Except the person who pushed this was former FEMA chief Michael "Heck of a Job" Brown on Fox News. Fox news didn't call him out on it. This was a clear attempt at spin endorsed by fox and friends.

I assume this is the quote you refer to:

Quote:

BROWN: The media has been ignoring it for two weeks. You don’t think that there were — look, they could have gotten on helicopters. They probably were on helicopters. We had other reconnaissance images from there.

But we only started to see them when it started to approach the Louisiana coast. And, then, oh, my God, look, we got to do something. I just — I think the media sat back. And I would not be surprised if the White House said, you know, we might be able to, guess what, do what? Use this crisis to our advantage. Let this crisis get really bad, and then we will step in. We will be able to shut down offshore drilling. We will be able to turn to all these alternate fuels.

And I think the problem they have right now is, they waited too long.

CAVUTO: So, by constantly referring to this as the BP still, the BP leak, the BP disaster, that there’s a method to that, right?

BROWN: Oh, absolutely.

Did you ever hear during Katrina anyone asking Ray Nagin or Governor Blanco the questions about why didn’t they evacuate, why did they choose the Superdome, how did you let people into the Convention Center? You heard none of that.

CAVUTO: That’s a good point.

BROWN: And, so, the media’s responsibility right now is, where was the EPA? Why was she out talking to David Letterman, instead of down on the Gulf Coast? She went to New Orleans. She talked to community organizers.

CAVUTO: All right.

Michael, thank you very much. Good seeing you again.

BROWN: Thank you, Neil. Same here.

CAVUTO: Michael Brown, the former FEMA director.

Former FEMA Director Michael Brown on Obama's Response to Oil Spill - Neil Cavuto | Your World - FOXNews.com

And here is the WH response:

YouTube - Gibbs Slams Fox News For Michael Brown Interview

And here is MSNBC interview:

YouTube - Chris Matthews To Michael Brown: Your Oil Rig Theories Sound 'Insane'

Reading what he said compared to the spin is interesting and I bet our conclusions differ - but one thing we know is that Brown got fired by Bush. And my point was that liberal glob on to stuff and make more of it than it is. Brown is one man with his own views.

{added} Just for the record, Covuto, in my opinion is fair with conservative leanings, and as I see the interview, Covuto did not take Brown's charge seriously, nor do I. Perhaps, conservatives can actually see things for what they are. Here is the entire interview:

YouTube- President Playing Politics With Oil Spill?

{added} I am listening to Covuto now, responding to the inaccurate spin from the WH, interesting.

roachboy · 05-05-2010, 12:17 PM

even the national review is backing away from the drill baby drill insouciance about the consequences the bidness of amurica is bidness line of the head-in-the-oil-saturated-sand conservative set. but here we have a milton friedman *defense* of the lax regulatory scenario that allowed *both* the deepwater horizon disaster and---worse---the inability to control the spills or to manage effectively a clean-up.

no-one would say that the accident itself was a result of an a priori situation (were that the case, there'd be no accident, just an unfolding of the consequences of a situation set up in advance)...problems arise from the ways in which the context was amenable to manipulation by bp for its own financial advantage at the expense of--well as it's turned out the gulf of mexico.

the line that "business knows business better than regulators know business" seems to me lunacy in this context. business as milton freidman defined it is the extraction of profits for shareholders. the only environmental protections that follow logically from that are the barest minimum to conform with legal and technical requirements---anything more would impact on vital shareholder profits. and uncle milton went on to argue that for a bidness to go further and try to actually be responsible for the resources that they plunder---erm use----in a more-than-bidness kinda way is both outside the competence of bidness and also unethical. for milton freidman anyway. whom no-one in their right mind takes seriously in 2010 as a philosopher of bidness.

you could, were you to for some reason find it amusing to play along with the uncle milty game, argue that it is **Exactly** for the reasons he outlines that extensive and ongoing regulation of business aimed at protecting not only natural resources (a yucky capitalist phrase) but also the environment from which they come that stewards one way or another these resources and contexts (bidness ain't great at context) from a non-business viewpoint would be necessary to compensate for the boundedness of a business rationality.

markets are obviously neither rational or equitable left to themselves and no-one in their right mind believes that firms will provide adequate environmental protections if ways around having to do it can be found (in the interest of vital shareholder profits of course)---i mean if you want proof just look at the colossal environmental disaster this thread is about and to the increasingly clear history of bp acting all milty friedmany about its responsibilities to plan for contigencies. and it's still ongoing, this disaster.

the disaster is largely is not a direct result of the accident itself. it's a result of the inability of british petroleum to manage the situation, which is a result of its not having planned for it, which is a result of their manoevering a pliant, pro-petroleum industry regulatory apparatus to exempt them from having to plan for it.

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 12:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

even the national review is backing away from the drill baby drill insouciance about the consequences the bidness of amurica is bidness line of the head-in-the-oil-saturated-sand conservative set. but here we have a milton friedman *defense* of the lax regulatory scenario that allowed *both* the deepwater horizon disaster and---worse---the inability to control the spills or to manage effectively a clean-up.

The demand for oil is very real and no person I have ever heard from supports drilling without balancing the trade offs between the risks and benefits. If you know a person who has taken such a stance, please share.

Quote:

no-one would say that the accident itself was a result of an a priori situation (were that the case, there'd be no accident, just an unfolding of the consequences of a situation set up in advance)...problems arise from the ways in which the context was amenable to manipulation by bp for its own financial advantage at the expense of--well as it's turned out the gulf of mexico.

This assessment is superficial. BP is motivated to make a profit or to maximize price for its product after costs - so BP will act to increase price and lower costs. We all know this. Given what we know, we have regulators, regulations, laws, taxation and other consequences for unacceptable behavior by companies like BP. It is obvious that BP's interests can conflict with "our" interests. I don't get your point? BP is going to do what they do - but so what? "We" need to do what we need to do! No one is taking a position of having no regulation.

Quote:

the line that "business knows business better than regulators know business" seems to me lunacy in this context.

It is either true or it is not. Regulation is the context. Again I don't get your point. There is a reason "regulation" is responsive. If you don't agree, please share your thoughts on the issue.

Quote:

business as milton freidman defined it is the extraction of profits for shareholders. the only environmental protections that follow logically from that are the barest minimum to conform with legal and technical requirements---anything more would impact on vital shareholder profits. and uncle milton went on to argue that for a bidness to go further and try to actually be responsible for the resources that they plunder---erm use----in a more-than-bidness kinda way is both outside the competence of bidness and also unethical. for milton freidman anyway. whom no-one in their right mind takes seriously in 2010 as a philosopher of bidness.

I interpret Friedman differently and your interpretation here is not understandable to me. All market participants have roles, is your point that they don't, or is it that you just don't want there to be a profit motive?

Quote:

you could, were you to for some reason find it amusing to play along with the uncle milty game, argue that it is **Exactly** for the reasons he outlines that extensive and ongoing regulation of business aimed at protecting not only natural resources (a yucky capitalist phrase) but also the environment from which they come that stewards one way or another these resources and contexts (bidness ain't great at context) from a non-business viewpoint would be necessary to compensate for the boundedness of a business rationality.

I am assuming you have no respect of the work of Friedman, is that correct? If so, what view in contradiction to his do you support? Friedman is by far the economist I most respect. I re-read his book Free to Choose every couple of years. My first exposure to him was in college in 1983, and it changed the way I view the world, economically, politically and socially. I will take this as serious as you want to take it.

Derwood · 05-05-2010, 01:06 PM

I love how ace jumps to some imagined MSNBC story as the source of my "conservative spin". I was actually referring to (in part) Michael Brown's interview on CNN (where Anderson Cooper nailed him to the wall).

aceventura3 · 05-05-2010, 01:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Derwood

I love how ace jumps to some imagined MSNBC story as the source of my "conservative spin". I was actually referring to (in part) Michael Brown's interview on CNN (where Anderson Cooper nailed him to the wall).

Sorry that I can not read your mind. And, I don't watch CNN (check my comments on CNN, there is a thread somewhere on Fox, CNN, and MSNBC). But, what I posted is not imagined - so what is your point? What i posted are not even my words, they are direct sources. The WH spin was a lie, why can't you see that? MSNBC is late to the party as usual and only seems to be motivated by turning everything into a big grand conservative conspiracy. MSNBC is better than the Comedy Channel, and I take it as serious.

Derwood · 05-05-2010, 02:44 PM

I don't watch MSNBC. They don't speak for me.

And Brown's comments didn't need to be spun....they were blatant lies/falsities that anyone with a brain could see for what they were

macmanmike6100 · 05-05-2010, 07:52 PM

I'm with you Cimarron -- this is a serious environmental disaster with far-reaching economic and social effects. BP should be held seriously liable and absolutely punished for their negligence, both in having only one back-up shut-off valve and for their slow reaction time.

The real problem is that there is little incentive to build in multiple shut-off valves and to fully account for the risk of spills. Government is there to hold people and companies accountable for their actions as they pertain to the greater good.

BP, then, must be held accountable for this massive spill, so that other oil-drilling corporations recognize that the price of an accident is greater than risky profits, at which point they will find ways to make profit less risky.

Cimarron29414 · 05-06-2010, 08:45 AM

Mike Brown is an ordinary citizen who got canned for doing a bad job during a national catastrophe and is trying to restore his personal reputation by pointing fingers. He is not acting as a spokesperson for a party.

Honestly, I thought Cavuto did a good job interviewing him and don't understand Gibbs' reaction. Cavuto just let the moron talk and hang himself. A good interviewer doesn't interject personal opinion or analysis of the interview during the interview. Of course, we have all forgotten what real journalism looks like. Brown's words are an adequate example of his idiocy, I don't need Cavuto, Gibbs, or Williams to enforce that fact.

ASU2003 · 05-06-2010, 10:46 PM

I wouldn't say I would blame Obama, but I do blame the EPA & the Coast Guard for not having some type of dome on stand-by within 1000 miles. They should have been able to have it on-site within 3 days.

And I don't 'blame' BP, unless they did cut corners on safety and the number of safeguards to prevent something like this. Accidents will happen, but they should be prepared and know what to do to stop it from becomming worse.

I would also blame the users of gas and oil, this is one of those things that subsidizes the true costs of gasoline. When gas went over $3 or $4, shipping companies added surcharges, yet the federal government and other clean-up organizations will spend millions on this (and BP won't pay for all of it), and the price of gas in Ohio won't go up or get taxed any more. The Federal income tax might have to go up or some other programs will get cut, but actually buying gas won't be impacted by this event. I wonder if having the beaches in the gulf damaged for a few years will change people's minds though.

*And even though I haven't been here for the past few days, it was because I got a new laptop, not because I am the person The_Dunedan talks about... I get sea sick. However, I had a good laugh about that conspiracy therory when the person called into Rush's show. It doesn't matter if there is no proof, and I would think it would be very hard for someone like James Bond to take a motor boat 50 miles off the coast at night, get onto the rig, place explosives on critical parts, leave, and then motor away.

roachboy · 05-07-2010, 03:50 AM

right. it's all a great big abstraction.

YouTube - Underwater video of oil gushing into Gulf of Mexico

edit: this footage is obviously of one of the submarines that's being used to try to deal with the leak. the first 1:30 appears to be taken up with checking on something with the device that's to do the sealing, which has a strangely anthropomorphic end to it, something like a mannerist fountain. i find these accidental design choices interesting and distracting dont you? anyway there's an edit at 1:37 seconds and from there on the submarine is at one of the 3 leaks. since the footage is from an attempt to position something with reference to the leak and not of it you have to focus on the background of the images to process what you're seeing. it's an interesting experience to watch this because of the movement through and then maybe away from seeing this as an abstraction.

roachboy · 05-07-2010, 06:14 AM

but of course a corporate person must needs protect that corporate person's image.

Quote:

May 6, 2010
For BP, a Battle to Contain Leaks and an Image Fight, Too
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS

VENICE, La. — As a crew prepared to lower a giant steel container 5,000 feet below the ocean’s surface Thursday evening to capture oil leaking from a ruptured well, the top executive of BP said he was not actually counting on it to work.

“It’s only one of the battle fronts,” said the chief executive, Tony Hayward, as his leased Sikorsky helicopter hovered 1,000 feet above the spot where the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform exploded on April 20, sending oil spurting into the Gulf of Mexico. BP was leasing the rig from the owner, Transocean.

Officials expected to have the containment dome lowered on cables and in position over the major leak on Thursday night. Late in the evening, the work was stalled because of dangerous fumes rising from the oily water in the windless night, the captain of the supply boat hauling the box told The Associated Press. A spark caused by the scrape of metal on metal could cause a fire, Capt. Demi Shaffer said.

Late Thursday, however, workers began lowering the dome on a journey to the seabed that was expected to take several hours, The A.P. reported.

Once the dome is in place, BP officials said that engineers would spend the next few days connecting a pipe from the huge metal box to a drill ship on the surface, and that the system might be running by early next week.

But Doug Suttles, BP’s chief operating officer, cautioned that this was an experimental approach at these depths, and that problems were likely to arise. He said it could take a week to get it working smoothly.

Meanwhile, the Coast Guard confirmed that the oil hit the Chandeleur Islands off Louisiana’s southeast tip on Thursday, and the state said two gannets, a type of large seabird, had been found dead, covered in oil.

Jacqui Michel of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said that the oil on the Chandeleur Islands was a thin sheen she described as an “emulsified light orange,” and that the thicker oil remained farther out at sea. Crews worked to clean the oil from the marsh grasses by flushing them with clean water.

“We flush until we get no more than sheen because sheen is not very much oil,” she said.

Mr. Hayward said he was convinced that his oil company would eventually get the growing spill under control using a variety of tools, from a flotilla of skimmers to the spraying of chemical dispersants and the drilling of relief wells to plug the leaks on the sea floor. “This is like the Normandy landing,” he said. “We know we are going to win. We just don’t know how quickly.”

Mr. Hayward’s helicopter tour of the region, which took him from Houma, La., to a spill-response center in Mobile, Ala., then back to Louisiana, was part of a public-relations effort to encourage spill workers and reassure worried Gulf Coast residents. He allowed a reporter for The New York Times to accompany him during the day, although BP declined to let the reporter observe some meetings.

Depending on the extent of the oil damage and the outcome of government investigations into the accident, BP could face billions of dollars in claims.

“The possibility remains that the BP oil spill could turn into an unprecedented environmental disaster,” Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on a visit to Biloxi, Miss. “The possibility remains that it will be somewhat less.”

Right now, as his technical experts combat the spill itself, Mr. Hayward is focusing on the war for public opinion. “You can win that battle by what you do and how you do it and then telling people about it,” he said in several conversations Thursday on his gulf tour.

Toward that goal, the cherub-cheeked Mr. Hayward is getting in front of the cameras as much as possible in an effort to put the best light on his giant oil company, which is arguably going through the greatest crisis in its storied history.

The stock of the London-based oil company has plunged, and officials in Washington are promising tighter regulations. On Thursday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the government would not issue any new permits for offshore drilling for at least three weeks, and it was unclear how much Congress might limit deepwater oil drilling, a big source of profit for BP and tax revenue for the government, in the future.

Mr. Hayward is also well aware that his job could be on the line. His predecessor was removed three years ago after high-profile accidents in Texas and Alaska tarred BP’s reputation.

Mr. Hayward, 52, says he is hoping to turn the disaster into something of an advantage, showing the world that BP will make the biggest effort possible to protect the gulf environment and get to the bottom of what caused the rig explosion that killed 11 workers.

He has been a constant public face both on network television and local stations, and a cameraman follows him everywhere to record video for BP’s Web site.

In interview after interview, Mr. Hayward repeatedly points to Transocean, the owner of the rig that exploded, as the company ultimately responsible for the damages. But at the same time, he is guaranteeing that BP will spare no efforts to clean up the mess.

Mr. Hayward said his primary task as chief executive during the crisis is to provide the “strategic direction, organizing resources, keeping the team focused — and being seen on the front line with the troops and communicating.”

For a man who says he shies away from media attention, Mr. Hayward appeared very comfortable in front of the cameras, making small talk and teasing reporters. Dressed simply in black loafers, black pants and a blue shirt without a tie, he frequently wore his sunglasses on his forehead.

Mr. Hayward started his day with a tour over the gulf, where he watched a ship delivering the collection dome, the first of two the company hopes to place over a leaking pipe to collect the oil. He then flew to the joint government-company command center in Mobile to get briefings on preparations for beach cleanups and boom placement. He hugged, backslapped and complimented Coast Guard officials and BP personnel organizing the effort.

He finished the day meeting with officials in Venice, La., where he spoke to fishermen loading booms on boats, asked for advice, and thanked them for their efforts.

“You guys are doing the best you can,” one fisherman said.

Mr. Hayward replied: “We’re trying very hard. If we could do more, let us know.”

Sam Dolnick contributed reporting from Baton Rouge, La.

From Air, BP?s Chief Sees Progress in Containing Spill - NYTimes.com

this seems very much a privatized george w bush flight over new orleans, doesn't it?

roachboy · 05-07-2010, 10:44 AM

more on the regulatory background for this mess, if regulatory you want to call it. this piece from today's wall st journal is about the minerals management service, a fine bunch of republican-instituted fellows who essentially tell the oil companies that it would be nice to be safe but don't do anything about practices that aren't....and cheerlead for "energy independence"---the way these missions get squared is by way of monitoring industry records about amounts of oil extracted and getting royalty payments. well, the other way they're squared is across a seemingly endless supply of handjobs for oil corporations. but read on:

U.S. Oil Regulator Ceded Safety Oversight to Drillers - WSJ.com

aceventura3 · 05-07-2010, 12:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

more on the regulatory background for this mess, if regulatory you want to call it. this piece from today's wall st journal is about the minerals management service, a fine bunch of republican-instituted fellows who essentially tell the oil companies that it would be nice to be safe but don't do anything about practices that aren't....and cheerlead for "energy independence"---the way these missions get squared is by way of monitoring industry records about amounts of oil extracted and getting royalty payments. well, the other way they're squared is across a seemingly endless supply of handjobs for oil corporations. but read on:

U.S. Oil Regulator Ceded Safety Oversight to Drillers - WSJ.com

I am intrigued by those, now after the fact, making charges against "regulators" for relying on the "industry" to help or to fully craft regulation. If I could interact with someone making those charges and willing to answer direct questions, I would start with the following:

Given continuing emerging technology that is often developed through industry R&D that has not been/can not be fully tried and tested in operational conditions before implementation, how would you develop safety/fail-safe regulations covering all contingencies without input from the "industry"?

For everyone else, again, BP has/had no incentive to waste millions of gallons of oil through an oil spill in the gulf, nor incur compensatory and potential punitive damages that will put their on going operations across the globe at risk. No one has yet to offer any hard proof that BP and any regulator failed to act in good faith.

roachboy · 05-07-2010, 12:59 PM

i only have a couple minutes (i have to be somewhere)....so am wondering: with a spill of this magnitude and potential for damage (and i hope it remains potential--i really hope the dome works) what difference does the attitude of bp make?

accidents happen..i don't think anyone is arguing except perhaps as an inversion of your characterizations of what people are arguing or saying, so as a straw man, that regulation can prevent accidents. but regulation can and should require that adequate contingency plans be in place to deal with them. it is self-evident that those plans were not in place in the gulf and that a significant explanation for that was the series of exemptions that bo got for itself in general and this facility in particular---which were only possible in the context of the long-standing relation of regulatory bodies to oil concerns that relies WAY too much on self-reporting.

Cimarron29414 · 05-07-2010, 01:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aceventura3

Given continuing emerging technology that is often developed through industry R&D that has not been/can not be fully tried and tested in operational conditions before implementation, how would you develop safety/fail-safe regulations covering all contingencies without input from the "industry"?

For everyone else, again, BP has/had no incentive to waste millions of gallons of oil through an oil spill in the gulf, nor incur compensatory and potential punitive damages that will put their on going operations across the globe at risk. No one has yet to offer any hard proof that BP and any regulator failed to act in good faith.

Ace,

You keep calling this hindsight, but they are touting this device as having worked in 400-500 feet, but untested in 5K feet. So clearly, at the conceptual level, they didn't just figure out this funnel/straw technique. There's no reason why this device could not have already existed and already been tested at 5K feet - because that's where the oil is! The fact that they already had this technique but they didn't have it built or tested for this depth means that they did NOT act in good faith to prepare for every possible scenario. Looks to me like they put ALL of their faith in 1 singular dead man switch at the ocean floor. That's pretty crappy.

I'm a pro-capitalism, anti-big government guy. But, there was obviously some pathetic disaster plans created for these deep wells. Do I fully understand who developed and approved those plans? Nope. Am I willing to allocate a percentage of responsibility to BP/Feds? Nope. But common sense shows that BP didn't do all they could, and every indication is because they were lazy, naive, or...frugal. With so much at stake, it's immoral to be any of those things.

ASU2003 · 05-08-2010, 04:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aceventura3

For everyone else, again, BP has/had no incentive to waste millions of gallons of oil through an oil spill in the gulf, nor incur compensatory and potential punitive damages that will put their on going operations across the globe at risk. No one has yet to offer any hard proof that BP and any regulator failed to act in good faith.

The oil is nothing, the dameage it does to the BP brand will cost more than the loss of this much oil.

But the regulators needed to ensure that safety proticols were being followed (they were within 200 miles of the US coast, so they were in US waters), and they should have had this dome structure on the move to the site the next day after they realized it was leaking oil, and before the robots got there. It seems like they put all of the hopes on the robots, and then when those didn't work, then they started moving the dome.

aceventura3 · 05-09-2010, 12:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ASU2003

But the regulators needed to ensure that safety proticols were being followed...

Some of the criticisms in the material cited in this thread seem to suggest that the safety protocol where inadequate (not in dispute by me) because, one reason given, the "industry" is largely involved in crafting the safety protocols. The latter is what I dispute. What I have been posting has had more to do with that question than anything else here.

Baraka_Guru · 05-10-2010, 06:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Derwood

The conservative spin machine has really gone off the rails with this.

A sampling of sound bites I've heard:

- This is Obama's Katrina (wut?)

[...]

In the paper this morning, I read an article that drew a more apt comparison: This is the oil industry's "Chernobyl."

---------- Post added at 10:13 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:10 AM ----------

Oh, and more bad news: The dome they are using to attempt to contain the spill has failed. It became clogged with crystallized gas....

The Great Beyond: Giant dome fails to fix Deepwater Horizon oil disaster

roachboy · 05-10-2010, 11:06 AM

Gulf oil spill: plugging the leak | News | guardian.co.uk

there is something so massively irresponsible about engaging in drilling a mile beneath the surface of the ocean if the firm that's doing the drilling has neither the technology nor the understanding required to build the technology necessary to contain damage that's caused if something goes wrong. and things do go wrong. even in an all milty freidmanny alternate universe, things will go wrong.

so basically at this point there are no ideas as to what to do.
i hope i'm understanding this wrong.
but that's what it looks like.

Baraka_Guru · 05-10-2010, 11:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

so basically at this point there are no ideas as to what to do.
i hope i'm understanding this wrong.
but that's what it looks like.

You mean besides the "junk plug"?

roachboy · 05-10-2010, 11:21 AM

the junk plug.
take tires and golfballs
scrunch them all together.
shoot them at the hole one mile below the surface of the ocean.

and there's this:

Quote:

Employing a junk shot could be risky, however, as experts have warned that excessive tinkering with the blowout preventer -- a 450-ton valve system that should have shut off the oil -- could see crude oil shoot out unchecked at 12 times the current rate.

Plan B to plug Gulf oil leak: the junk shot

Cimarron29414 · 05-10-2010, 11:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru

You mean besides the "junk plug"?

Junk plug. Apparently Beavis and Butthead are running BP research.

I can't believe there isn't some cylindrical robot that can "crawl" in the pipe and then expand to the diameter of the pipe, thus plugging it off. Man has been plugging tubes with cylidrically shaped objects for millenia. It doesn't seem that difficult. I'm sure some nerds at MIT are whipping one up as we speak. Of course, the robotic pipe plug would have been nice to have say, three weeks ago. Yeah, yeah. Hindsight and all that.

---------- Post added at 03:35 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:32 PM ----------

12 times faster!?!? Yeah, that sounds like a great, low risk idea. Let's move on to that one. And I thought the funnel/pipe was a bit kooky.

Wonder why you can't take some sort of heat source to the crystallized methane and melt it off - have the robot take, I don't know, some sort of flare or high heat light down there. It seems that it is a finite amount that must be removed and then the box thingy is back in business.

ASU2003 · 05-10-2010, 06:47 PM

Should US nuke the BP oil spill - like the Russians used to | News & Politics | News & Comment | The First Post

1550 nuclear bombs on the wall, 1550 nuclear bombs, drop one down, blow it to hell, 1549 nuclear bombs on the wall...

I don't know what is sadder, that this might be the best option or that nobody can come up with something to stop this leak.

The_Dunedan · 05-11-2010, 06:11 AM

Actually, a tactical (sub-kiloton) nuke shot might not be a bad idea. The intense heat and pressure (locally) would "weld" the leak shut by melting and glassifying the seabed, and due to the extreme depth and pressures at the leak site very little radiation and zero fallout would even be measurable at the surface. Experience in the 50s and 60s would seem to indicate also that radioactive particle contamination at those depths would be slight, and would consist mostly of fragments of the munition casing itself along with a fine layer of radioactive seabed material which would be quickly sedimented over, especially in the particle-rich waters off the Mississippi delta. Given that nobody's pulling any three-eyed fish out of Bikini Atoll or any of the other submarine test-shot sites (mostly shallow-water) and that this spill has the destructive potential (in economic terms at very least) of an actual atom-bomb attack on a major city, something like what the Russians are suggesting might not be a bad idea.

Rekna · 05-11-2010, 06:21 AM

I thought about this too. It would be akin to cauterizing a wound. However, what happens if it doesn't work and it just makes the hole bigger? Also what is the effect on our food supply that comes from that region?

Baraka_Guru · 05-11-2010, 06:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

I thought about this too. It would be akin to cauterizing a wound. However, what happens if it doesn't work and it just makes the hole bigger? Also what is the effect on our food supply that comes from that region?

Yes, the Russians did it in the middle of a desert, and they weren't sure it would even work.

Detonating a nuke for something like this on the sea bed sounds like a bad idea to me. It seems like a huge risk considering the minimal amount of control you have over the situation and the environment.

If something goes wrong, it would seem to me that it would go very, very wrong.

aceventura3 · 05-11-2010, 07:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

so basically at this point there are no ideas as to what to do.
i hope i'm understanding this wrong.
but that's what it looks like.

There is a reason why BP wanted to use the "container" before trying the "junk shot". My assumption is that the "container" would have made it easier to salvage oil or to get the well into production sooner. We can make jokes about the high tech compared to the low tech solutions, but the irony is that when we talk about being irresponsible using the high tech solution before using what will actually work is probably the best argument against BP in this whole thing.

roachboy · 05-11-2010, 07:59 AM

i wasn't making a joke, ace. i actually hoped the giant funnel would work and was disappointed when all that pesky methane turned up to spoil things.

a nuke? that this is on the table is an indication that things are reaching a space of desperation, yes? does that seem plausible?

05-05-2010, 06:06 AM	#41 (permalink)
Derwood Who You Crappin? Location: Everywhere and Nowhere	The conservative spin machine has really gone off the rails with this. A sampling of sound bites I've heard: - This is Obama's Katrina (wut?) - Environmental radicals sabotaged the pipeline to make a political stance - Obama administration WANTED a crisis like this - This is good for Obama because he's so anti-oil (even though he just opened off shore drilling and ran on a pro-drilling platform) __________________ "You can't shoot a country until it becomes a democracy." - Willravel

05-05-2010, 07:59 AM	#42 (permalink)
Baraka_Guru warrior bodhisattva Super Moderator Location: East-central Canada	Reading the bits coming from scientists and academics regarding the impact of the oil and the continuing problems of its still spewing into the ocean (the rate at which it spews, and how long it might take to stop it), I have a rather frightening sense that they're coming to a consensus, whether consciously or not: This is likely become the greatest environmental disaster in American history. We're not nearly as alarmed as we should be, probably because it's happening in slow motion. And now for some updates, of varying significance: Gulf of Mexico oil spill: one of three leaks capped - Telegraph Texas Governor calls Louisiana oil spill 'act of God' - Telegraph __________________ Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing? —Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön Humankind cannot bear very much reality. —From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot Last edited by Baraka_Guru; 05-05-2010 at 08:01 AM..

05-05-2010, 09:37 AM	#44 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	While it may have been an act of God which caused the spill (which is sort of a legal term for a nature event causing the damage as opposed to human error), that does not change the fact that man was entirely unprepared and sluggish in containing the damage the act of God could(will) cause - which is the egregious part. We have a moral obligation to have safety/containment measures in place for something like this. This event has certainly exposed to me the cavalier approach that man has taken in underwater drilling. I still believe that collecting this oil is necessary, but I can't believe they didn't have a system, a backup system, and a backup's backup for instantly capping a pipe at the ocean floor. __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly." Last edited by Cimarron29414; 05-05-2010 at 10:41 AM..

05-05-2010, 09:43 AM	#45 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	this piece from the washington post may explain some of the specific lack of preparedness around this bp site. it was exempted from safety reviews undertaken by interior thanks to bp lobbying efforts. the safety reports that were issued presupposed that what has happened was impossible. best to look at the linked article because it contains links to supplementary materials. washingtonpost.com __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-05-2010, 09:54 AM	#46 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	You know, the more I think about this the more it pisses me off. If I want to move an electrical outlet in my house 1 inch to the right, I have to go get a permit. An inspector comes to my house and looks at the site and my plans. I have to have the work performed by a licensed professional. Then, the inspector returns and makes certain that the work meets regulations. That's for me, my house, my risk. This is the fucking Gulf of Mexico. 50 million people, a trillion pieces of wildlife. And another thing: didn't they pull 11 people of this rig? Why do we have to speculate what happened? Can't we waterboard those guys and find out? __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly." Last edited by Cimarron29414; 05-05-2010 at 10:15 AM..

05-05-2010, 10:36 AM	#48 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	ace---i'm busy at the moment, but have a look at the post i put up above that references a blog from mit press: there's an interesting and useful overview of the regulatory regime that frames oil drilling in general that talks specifically about the processes that are referenced again in the post article. it provides a bit of context that i found useful. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-05-2010, 10:47 AM	#50 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	Ace, My point is this. It's been, what?, 14 days or so? They constructed some box with a funnel and a pipe on it to put over the hole and route the oil to a ship. Why didn't they have that built and sitting under a tarp in Mobile Alabama - ready to be shipped to the gulf on a moment's notice? Why did it take 7 days to even start to build such a safety measure? That's my problem with this whole thing - you have to figure shit like that out BEFORE you drill, not after the spill. __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly."

05-05-2010, 12:17 PM	#54 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	even the national review is backing away from the drill baby drill insouciance about the consequences the bidness of amurica is bidness line of the head-in-the-oil-saturated-sand conservative set. but here we have a milton friedman defense of the lax regulatory scenario that allowed both the deepwater horizon disaster and---worse---the inability to control the spills or to manage effectively a clean-up. no-one would say that the accident itself was a result of an a priori situation (were that the case, there'd be no accident, just an unfolding of the consequences of a situation set up in advance)...problems arise from the ways in which the context was amenable to manipulation by bp for its own financial advantage at the expense of--well as it's turned out the gulf of mexico. the line that "business knows business better than regulators know business" seems to me lunacy in this context. business as milton freidman defined it is the extraction of profits for shareholders. the only environmental protections that follow logically from that are the barest minimum to conform with legal and technical requirements---anything more would impact on vital shareholder profits. and uncle milton went on to argue that for a bidness to go further and try to actually be responsible for the resources that they plunder---erm use----in a more-than-bidness kinda way is both outside the competence of bidness and also unethical. for milton freidman anyway. whom no-one in their right mind takes seriously in 2010 as a philosopher of bidness. you could, were you to for some reason find it amusing to play along with the uncle milty game, argue that it is Exactly for the reasons he outlines that extensive and ongoing regulation of business aimed at protecting not only natural resources (a yucky capitalist phrase) but also the environment from which they come that stewards one way or another these resources and contexts (bidness ain't great at context) from a non-business viewpoint would be necessary to compensate for the boundedness of a business rationality. markets are obviously neither rational or equitable left to themselves and no-one in their right mind believes that firms will provide adequate environmental protections if ways around having to do it can be found (in the interest of vital shareholder profits of course)---i mean if you want proof just look at the colossal environmental disaster this thread is about and to the increasingly clear history of bp acting all milty friedmany about its responsibilities to plan for contigencies. and it's still ongoing, this disaster. the disaster is largely is not a direct result of the accident itself. it's a result of the inability of british petroleum to manage the situation, which is a result of its not having planned for it, which is a result of their manoevering a pliant, pro-petroleum industry regulatory apparatus to exempt them from having to plan for it. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 05-05-2010 at 12:23 PM..

05-05-2010, 01:06 PM	#56 (permalink)
Derwood Who You Crappin? Location: Everywhere and Nowhere	I love how ace jumps to some imagined MSNBC story as the source of my "conservative spin". I was actually referring to (in part) Michael Brown's interview on CNN (where Anderson Cooper nailed him to the wall). __________________ "You can't shoot a country until it becomes a democracy." - Willravel

05-05-2010, 02:44 PM	#58 (permalink)
Derwood Who You Crappin? Location: Everywhere and Nowhere	I don't watch MSNBC. They don't speak for me. And Brown's comments didn't need to be spun....they were blatant lies/falsities that anyone with a brain could see for what they were __________________ "You can't shoot a country until it becomes a democracy." - Willravel

05-05-2010, 07:52 PM	#59 (permalink)
macmanmike6100 High Honorary Junkie Location: Tri-state.	I'm with you Cimarron -- this is a serious environmental disaster with far-reaching economic and social effects. BP should be held seriously liable and absolutely punished for their negligence, both in having only one back-up shut-off valve and for their slow reaction time. The real problem is that there is little incentive to build in multiple shut-off valves and to fully account for the risk of spills. Government is there to hold people and companies accountable for their actions as they pertain to the greater good. BP, then, must be held accountable for this massive spill, so that other oil-drilling corporations recognize that the price of an accident is greater than risky profits, at which point they will find ways to make profit less risky.

05-06-2010, 08:45 AM	#60 (permalink)
Cimarron29414 Still Free Location: comfortably perched at the top of the bell curve!	Mike Brown is an ordinary citizen who got canned for doing a bad job during a national catastrophe and is trying to restore his personal reputation by pointing fingers. He is not acting as a spokesperson for a party. Honestly, I thought Cavuto did a good job interviewing him and don't understand Gibbs' reaction. Cavuto just let the moron talk and hang himself. A good interviewer doesn't interject personal opinion or analysis of the interview during the interview. Of course, we have all forgotten what real journalism looks like. Brown's words are an adequate example of his idiocy, I don't need Cavuto, Gibbs, or Williams to enforce that fact. __________________ Gives a man a halo, does mead. "Here lies The_Jazz: Killed by an ambitious, sparkly, pink butterfly." Last edited by Cimarron29414; 05-06-2010 at 08:48 AM..

05-06-2010, 10:46 PM	#61 (permalink)
ASU2003 immoral minority Location: Back in Ohio	I wouldn't say I would blame Obama, but I do blame the EPA & the Coast Guard for not having some type of dome on stand-by within 1000 miles. They should have been able to have it on-site within 3 days. And I don't 'blame' BP, unless they did cut corners on safety and the number of safeguards to prevent something like this. Accidents will happen, but they should be prepared and know what to do to stop it from becomming worse. I would also blame the users of gas and oil, this is one of those things that subsidizes the true costs of gasoline. When gas went over $3 or $4, shipping companies added surcharges, yet the federal government and other clean-up organizations will spend millions on this (and BP won't pay for all of it), and the price of gas in Ohio won't go up or get taxed any more. The Federal income tax might have to go up or some other programs will get cut, but actually buying gas won't be impacted by this event. I wonder if having the beaches in the gulf damaged for a few years will change people's minds though. And even though I haven't been here for the past few days, it was because I got a new laptop, not because I am the person The_Dunedan talks about... I get sea sick. However, I had a good laugh about that conspiracy therory when the person called into Rush's show. It doesn't matter if there is no proof, and I would think it would be very hard for someone like James Bond to take a motor boat 50 miles off the coast at night, get onto the rig, place explosives on critical parts, leave, and then motor away. Last edited by ASU2003; 05-06-2010 at 10:48 PM..*

05-07-2010, 10:44 AM	#64 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	more on the regulatory background for this mess, if regulatory you want to call it. this piece from today's wall st journal is about the minerals management service, a fine bunch of republican-instituted fellows who essentially tell the oil companies that it would be nice to be safe but don't do anything about practices that aren't....and cheerlead for "energy independence"---the way these missions get squared is by way of monitoring industry records about amounts of oil extracted and getting royalty payments. well, the other way they're squared is across a seemingly endless supply of handjobs for oil corporations. but read on: U.S. Oil Regulator Ceded Safety Oversight to Drillers - WSJ.com __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-07-2010, 12:59 PM	#66 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i only have a couple minutes (i have to be somewhere)....so am wondering: with a spill of this magnitude and potential for damage (and i hope it remains potential--i really hope the dome works) what difference does the attitude of bp make? accidents happen..i don't think anyone is arguing except perhaps as an inversion of your characterizations of what people are arguing or saying, so as a straw man, that regulation can prevent accidents. but regulation can and should require that adequate contingency plans be in place to deal with them. it is self-evident that those plans were not in place in the gulf and that a significant explanation for that was the series of exemptions that bo got for itself in general and this facility in particular---which were only possible in the context of the long-standing relation of regulatory bodies to oil concerns that relies WAY too much on self-reporting. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-10-2010, 11:06 AM	#71 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	Gulf oil spill: plugging the leak \| News \| guardian.co.uk there is something so massively irresponsible about engaging in drilling a mile beneath the surface of the ocean if the firm that's doing the drilling has neither the technology nor the understanding required to build the technology necessary to contain damage that's caused if something goes wrong. and things do go wrong. even in an all milty freidmanny alternate universe, things will go wrong. so basically at this point there are no ideas as to what to do. i hope i'm understanding this wrong. but that's what it looks like. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-10-2010, 06:47 PM	#75 (permalink)
ASU2003 immoral minority Location: Back in Ohio	Should US nuke the BP oil spill - like the Russians used to \| News & Politics \| News & Comment \| The First Post 1550 nuclear bombs on the wall, 1550 nuclear bombs, drop one down, blow it to hell, 1549 nuclear bombs on the wall... I don't know what is sadder, that this might be the best option or that nobody can come up with something to stop this leak.

05-11-2010, 06:11 AM	#76 (permalink)
The_Dunedan Junkie	Actually, a tactical (sub-kiloton) nuke shot might not be a bad idea. The intense heat and pressure (locally) would "weld" the leak shut by melting and glassifying the seabed, and due to the extreme depth and pressures at the leak site very little radiation and zero fallout would even be measurable at the surface. Experience in the 50s and 60s would seem to indicate also that radioactive particle contamination at those depths would be slight, and would consist mostly of fragments of the munition casing itself along with a fine layer of radioactive seabed material which would be quickly sedimented over, especially in the particle-rich waters off the Mississippi delta. Given that nobody's pulling any three-eyed fish out of Bikini Atoll or any of the other submarine test-shot sites (mostly shallow-water) and that this spill has the destructive potential (in economic terms at very least) of an actual atom-bomb attack on a major city, something like what the Russians are suggesting might not be a bad idea.

05-11-2010, 06:21 AM	#77 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	I thought about this too. It would be akin to cauterizing a wound. However, what happens if it doesn't work and it just makes the hole bigger? Also what is the effect on our food supply that comes from that region?

05-11-2010, 07:59 AM	#80 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i wasn't making a joke, ace. i actually hoped the giant funnel would work and was disappointed when all that pesky methane turned up to spoil things. a nuke? that this is on the table is an indication that things are reaching a space of desperation, yes? does that seem plausible? __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite