BP Oil Spill ‘A Whale’ Tests Inconclusive: High Seas to Blame

Courtesy U.S. Coast Guard

Gulf of Mexico (Jul 7) – For over two months now, scientists and engineers working the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster have yet to bring the rigs gusher under control. Tar balls begin spreading westward washing up on Texas beaches.

As oil is still gushing from the wellhead at over 60,000 barrels a day, BP is still having problems coping with the situation. The poorly fitted riser pipe and cap system is still less than fifty percent effective in dealing with the situation.

Following Hurricane Alex and numerous unrelated storms in the Gulf region producing high seas, scuttling existing efforts by teams of thousands of smaller skimmer boats, have left the latest hopes, A Whale’s efforts in question.

BP claims to have a plan to increase its capacity of capturing crude from the temporary riser pipe, as well as replacing the system. Overall, the planned changes will capture upwards of 53,000 barrels a day leaving the remaining 10,000 barrels per day to drift off causing further environmental damage in the Gulf leaving uncounted numbers of marine life unprotected, poisoned, and possibly killed.

Accordingly, the Obama administration is doing everything they can to aid in the cleanup and recovery efforts of this, yet another manmade environmental catastrophe. There are more than 17,000 National Guard Troops from Gulf States available for response and cleanup efforts as well as, more than 45,000 personnel on the ground to protect the shoreline.

There are over 6,900 ships and skimmers available and responding as weather permits, and millions of feet of various containment boom in place as well as, being maintained.

To date, some 484 miles of Gulf Coast shorelines are contaminated, some areas will be without a doubt, permanently uninhabitable for decades to come; this number does not reflect the miles of shoreline hard working volunteers have already cleared.  Close to 82,000 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico, polluted and closed to fishing and other related industries. That is close to a third of the entire Gulf of Mexico, permanently scarred by carelessness, and unnecessary deepwater oil exploration.

Countries from around the world have been pitching in to help, as the administration has leveraged assets from international organizations as part of this being referred to as a, all-hands-on-deck approach to the run-a-way oil gusher. The following countries and agencies are lending a hand in the effort to end this disaster: Belgium, Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Qatar, Russia, Spain, United Kingdom, Tunisia the United Nations’ International Maritime Organization, the European Union’s Monitoring, and Information Centre, and the European Maritime Safety Agency.

Posted by rgrone on July 7, 2010. Filed under Environment,National News,News,Politics,Right Wing,Science and Tech,US Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.