Topic: Deepwater Horizon

[Nichi]

A catastrophe is afoot in the Gulf of Mexico, for the birds and other marine life. The oil rig which exploded, and is now leaking greater amounts of oil every day, blackens the sea in an age wherein the technology is still nonexistent to clean it up.

Hurricane season is just around the corner to boot - it seems a fair prediction that the shore birds are going to be inundated with oil.

The Gulf Coast is nothing if not teeming with bird life.

[Nichi]

Gulf oil spill could reach shore Thursday night

NEW ORLEANS – The edge of a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was expected to reach the Mississippi River delta by Thursday night and a new technique to break up the oil a mile underwater could be tried, officials said.

As of this morning, part of the slick was about 3 miles from the Louisiana shore, said National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration spokesman Charles Henry said. It's too late to stop some of the spill from reaching the coast, but BP PLC said it might attempt to break up some of the oil spewing from a blown-out a mile under water.

The company also has asked the Department of Defense if it can help with better underwater equipment than is available commercially, said BP PLC chief operating officer Doug Suttles.

In addition, he said the company has been reviewing research on using chemical to break up the oil, which has been done before, but never at these depths. The well is almost a mile underwater off the Louisiana shore.

U.S. Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry called it "a novel, absolutely novel idea."

Meanwhile, Louisiana Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency and announced that BP had agreed to allow local fishermen to assist in the expected cleanup. Under the agreement, shrimpers and fishermen could be contracted by BP to help. Jindal said the state was also training prison inmates to help clean up wildlife harmed by oil slicks moving toward shore.

The federal government sent in skimmers and booms Thursday. BP operated the rig that exploded and sank 50 miles offshore last week, which led to the spill, and is directing the cleanup and trying to stop the leak.

If the chemical technique is approved, work could start tonight, Suttles said.

"We want to pursue every technique we can find," he said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100429/ap_on_bi_ge/us_louisiana_oil_rig_explosion

[Michael]

Yep - been hearing about this. Some saying it's in control, or not too serious, and others saying it will be the worst oil spill disaster for a century.

[Nichi]

I'm all for these reports being exaggerations.

Gulf Coast oil spill could eclipse Exxon Valdez

Burdeau And Holbrook Mohr, Associated Press Writers – 2 mins ago

MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER – Faint fingers of oily sheen have reached the mouth of Mississippi River, the vanguard of a massive spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The slick is making its way toward a delicate environment of birds, marine life and some of the nation's richest seafood grounds.

By sunset Thursday, the oil had creeped into South Pass of the river and was lapping at the shoreline in long, thin lines.

Booms in place to protect grasslands and sandy beaches are being over topped by 5-foot waves of oily water in choppy seas.

In the distance, the lights of the fleet of boats working to keep more of the crude oil away from the coast were outlined in the dying twilight.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

VENICE, La. (AP) — An oil spill that threatened to eclipse even the Exxon Valdez disaster spread out of control and drifted inexorably toward the Gulf Coast on Thursday as fishermen rushed to scoop up shrimp and crews spread floating barriers around marshes.

The spill was both bigger and closer than imagined — five times larger than first estimated, with the leading edge just three miles from the Louisiana shore. Authorities said it could reach the Mississippi River delta by Thursday night.

"It is of grave concern," David Kennedy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told The Associated Press. "I am frightened. This is a very, very big thing. And the efforts that are going to be required to do anything about it, especially if it continues on, are just mind-boggling."

The oil slick could become the nation's worst environmental disaster in decades, threatening hundreds of species of fish, birds and other wildlife along the Gulf Coast, one of the world's richest seafood grounds, teeming with shrimp, oysters and other marine life.

The leak from the ocean floor proved to be far bigger than initially reported, contributing to a growing sense among many in Louisiana that the government failed them again, just as it did during Hurricane Katrina. President Barack Obama dispatched Cabinet officials to deal with the crisis.

Cade Thomas, a fishing guide in Venice, worried that his livelihood will be destroyed. He said he did not know whether to blame the Coast Guard, the federal government or oil company BP PLC.

"They lied to us. They came out and said it was leaking 1,000 barrels when I think they knew it was more. And they weren't proactive," he said. "As soon as it blew up, they should have started wrapping it with booms."

The Coast Guard worked with BP, which operated the oil rig that exploded and sank last week, to deploy floating booms, skimmers and chemical dispersants, and set controlled fires to burn the oil off the water's surface.

The Coast Guard urged the company to formally request more resources from the Defense Department. A BP executive said the corporation would "take help from anyone."

Government officials said the blown-out well 40 miles offshore is spewing five times as much oil into the water as originally estimated — about 5,000 barrels, or 200,000 gallons, a day.

At that rate, the spill could easily eclipse the worst oil spill in U.S. history — the 11 million gallons that leaked from the grounded tanker Exxon Valdez in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 — in the three months it could take to drill a relief well and plug the gushing well 5,000 feet underwater on the sea floor.

Ultimately, the spill could grow much larger than the Valdez because Gulf of Mexico wells typically hold many times more oil than a single tanker.

Doug Suttles, chief operating officer for BP Exploration and Production, had initially disputed the government's larger estimate. But he later acknowledged on NBC's "Today" show that the leak may be as bad as federal officials say. He said there was no way to measure the flow at the seabed, so estimates have to come from how much oil rises to the surface.

Mike Brewer, 40, who lost his oil spill response company in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina nearly five years ago, said the area was accustomed to the occasional minor spill. But he feared the scale of the escaping oil was beyond the capacity of existing resources.

"You're pumping out a massive amount of oil. There is no way to stop it," he said.

An emergency shrimping season was opened to allow shrimpers to scoop up their catch before it is fouled by oil. Cannons were to be used to scare off birds. And shrimpers were being lined up to use their boats as makeshift skimmers in the shallows.

This murky water and the oysters in it have provided a livelihood for three generations of Frank and Mitch Jurisich's family in Empire, La.

Now, on the open water just beyond the marshes, they can smell the oil that threatens everything they know and love.

"Just smelling it, it puts more of a sense of urgency, a sense of fear," Frank Jurisich said.

The brothers hope to get all the oysters they can sell before the oil washes ashore. They filled more than 100 burlap sacks Thursday and stopped to eat some oysters. "This might be our last day," Mitch Jurisich said.

Without the fishing industry, Frank Jurisich said the family "would be lost. This is who we are and what we do."

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency Thursday so officials could begin preparing for the oil's impact. He said at least 10 wildlife management areas and refuges in his state and neighboring Mississippi are in the oil plume's path.

The declaration also noted that billions of dollars have been invested in coastal restoration projects that may be at risk.

As dawn broke Thursday in the oil industry hub of Venice, about 75 miles from New Orleans and not far from the mouth of the Mississippi River, crews loaded an orange oil boom aboard a supply boat at Bud's Boat Launch. There, local officials expressed frustration with the pace of the government's response and the communication they were getting from the Coast Guard and BP officials.

"We're not doing everything we can do," said Billy Nungesser, president of Plaquemines Parish, which straddles the Mississippi River at the tip of Louisiana.

Tension was growing in towns like Port Sulphur and Empire along Louisiana Highway 23, which runs south of New Orleans along the Mississippi River into prime oyster and shrimping waters.

Companies like Chevron and ConocoPhillips have facilities nearby, and some residents are hesitant to criticize BP or the federal government, knowing the oil industry is as much a staple here as fishing.

"I don't think there's a lot of blame going around here. People are just concerned about their livelihoods," said Sullivan Vullo, who owns La Casa Cafe in Port Sulphur.

A federal class-action lawsuit was filed late Wednesday on behalf of two commercial shrimpers from Louisiana, Acy J. Cooper Jr. and Ronnie Louis Anderson.

The suit seeks at least $5 million in compensatory damages plus an unspecified amount of punitive damages against Transocean, BP, Halliburton Energy Services Inc. and Cameron International Corp.

In Buras, La., where Hurricane Katrina made landfall in 2005, the owner of the Black Velvet Oyster Bar & Grill couldn't keep his eyes off the television. News and weather shows were making projections that oil would soon inundate the coastal wetlands where his family has worked since the 1860s.

It was as though a hurricane was approaching, maybe worse.

"A hurricane is like closing your bank account for a few days, but this here has the capacity to destroy our bank accounts," said Byron Marinovitch, 47.

"We're really disgusted," he added. "We don't believe anything coming out of BP's mouth."

Signs of the 2005 hurricane are still apparent here: There are schools, homes, churches and restaurants operating out of trailers, and across from Marinovitch's bar is a wood frame house abandoned since the storm.

A fleet of boats working under an oil industry consortium has been using booms to corral and then skim oil from the surface.

The Coast Guard abandoned a plan Wednesday to set fire to the leaking oil after sea conditions deteriorated. The attempt to burn some of the oil came after crews operating submersible robots failed to activate a shut-off device that would halt the flow of oil.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was briefed Thursday on the issue, said his spokesman, Capt. John Kirby. But Kirby said the Defense Department has received no request for help, nor is it doing any detailed planning for any mission on the oil spill.

Obama dispatched Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson to help with the spill. The president said the White House would use "every single available resource" to respond.

Obama has directed officials to aggressively confront the spill, but the cost of the cleanup will fall on BP, White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100430/ap_on_bi_ge/us_louisiana_oil_rig_explosion

[Firestarter]

This sucks guys.

[Nichi]

Definitely.

[Nichi]

New York Times Oil Slick Map


Gulf coast oil spill potential disaster for birds

Organizations such as the Audubon Society are gearing up to help in a possible epic crisis in the gulf coast as the almost 100 mile long oil spill edges near important bird sensitive areas. The oil spill is so large that it can be seem from space from a NASA satellite. If the spill reaches the coast it will be disastrous for birds and other wildlife.

At risk are the: Chandeleur Islands IBA; Gulf Islands National Seashore IBA in Louisiana and Mississippi; and the Active Delta IBA in Louisiana, which includes Delta National Wildlife Refuge and Pass-a-Loutre Wildlife Management Area. The brown pelican, many species of terns, shorebirds, herons, egrets, marsh birds, ocean dwelling birds, songbirds, and migratory birds are in peril. Unfortunately this time of years is also nesting and spawning season as well.

There are possible long term consequences to the eco system if the oil gets into marshes and wetlands causing disastrous impact on birds and other wildlife. The International Bird Rescue Research Center has been put on alert to help organize volunteers and help oiled birds in need.

Audubon Map of Important Bird Areas



Oil Slick from Rig Collapse Seen from Space
By LiveScience Staff

26 April 2010 04:40 pm ET

The oil slick that is expanding from the site of an oil rig collapse last week has been spotted from space by a NASA satellite.

An estimated 42,000 gallons of oil per day are leaking from an oil well in the Gulf of Mexico after an oil rig caught fire and then sank into the ocean waters last week.

The only oil evident in the water at first was that which had been on the rig itself at the time it exploded on April 20. Over the weekend, officials working on the oil spill discovered that water was also leaking from the pipe that led up to the rig from the well some 5,000 feet (1,524 meters) below on the seafloor.

NASA's Aqua satellite took a photograph of the affected area on Sunday, April 25, in which the oil slick — which currently covers an area 48 miles long (77 kilometers) and 39 miles wide (63 km), according to news reports — can be seen.

The Mississippi Delta is the center of the image, and the oil slick is a silvery swirl in the lower right. The oil slick may be particularly obvious because it is occurring in the sunlit area, where the mirror-like reflection of the sun off the water gives the Gulf of Mexico a washed-out look.

The slick may contain dispersants or other chemicals that emergency responders are using to control the spread of the oil, and it is unknown how much of the 700,000 gallons of fuel that were on the oil rig burned in the fire and how much may have spilled into the water when the platform sank.

An emergency response effort is underway to stop the flow of oil and contain the existing slick before it reaches wildlife refuges and beaches in Louisiana and Mississippi.

The oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico that resulted from the explosion and collapse of an oil rig can be seen in this image from NASA's Aqua satellite. At left is the Mississippi Delta. The slick is the lighter colored area in the lower right. Credit: MODIS Rapid Response Team

IMAGE ATTACHED

[Nichi]

[Nichi]

2008

[Nichi]

[Nichi]

Reddish Egret Dancing



Roseate Spoonbills



Royal Tern



Snowy Egrets



Little Blue Heron



Cattle Egrets

[Nichi]

Pelicans, otters along La. shore in path of spill
Cain Burdeau, Associated Press Writers – 1 hr 17 mins ago

MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER – Migrating birds and those along the shoreline, nesting pelicans and even river otters and mink along Louisiana's fragile islands and barrier marshes are the first in the path of a massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill that was starting to ooze ashore.

The leak from a blown-out well a mile underwater is five times bigger than first believed. Faint fingers of oily sheen were reaching the Mississippi River delta late Thursday, lapping the Louisiana shoreline in long, thin lines. Thicker oil was about five miles offshore. Officials have said they would do everything to keep the Mississippi River open to traffic.

The oil slick could become the nation's worst environmental disaster in decades, threatening to eclipse even the Exxon Valdez in scope. It imperils hundreds of species of fish, birds and other wildlife along the Gulf Coast, one of the world's richest seafood grounds, teeming with shrimp, oysters and other marine life.

"It is of grave concern," David Kennedy of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told The Associated Press about the spill. "I am frightened. This is a very, very big thing. And the efforts that are going to be required to do anything about it, especially if it continues on, are just mind-boggling."

Oil clumps seabirds' feathers, leaving them without insulation — and when they preen, they swallow it. Prolonged contact with the skin can cause burns, said Nils Warnock, a spill recovery supervisor with the California Oiled Wildlife Care Network at the University of California. Oil swallowed by animals can cause anemia, hemorrhaging and other problems, said Jay Holcomb, executive director of the International Bird Rescue Research Center in California.

The spewing oil — about 210,000 gallons a day — comes from a well drilled by the rig Deepwater Horizon, which exploded in flames April 20 and sank two days later. BP PLC was operating the rig that was owned by Transocean Ltd. The Coast Guard is working with BP to deploy floating booms, skimmers and chemical dispersants, and set controlled fires to burn the oil off the water's surface.

Protective boom has been set out on Breton Island, where colonial species such as pelicans, gulls and skimmers nest, and at the sandy tips of the passes from the Mississippi River's birdfoot delta, said Robert Love, a state wildlife official.

The leak from the ocean floor proved to be far bigger than initially reported, contributing to a growing sense among some in Louisiana that the government failed them again, just as it did during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. President Barack Obama dispatched Cabinet officials to deal with the crisis.

Cade Thomas, a fishing guide in Venice, worried that his livelihood will be destroyed. He said he did not know whether to blame the Coast Guard, the government or BP.

"They lied to us. They came out and said it was leaking 1,000 barrels when I think they knew it was more. And they weren't proactive," he said. "As soon as it blew up, they should have started wrapping it with booms."

Government officials said the well 40 miles offshore is spewing about 5,000 barrels, or 200,000 gallons, a day into the gulf.

At that rate, the spill could eclipse the worst oil spill in U.S. history — the 11 million gallons that leaked from the grounded tanker Exxon Valdez in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 — in the three months it could take to drill a relief well and plug the gushing well 5,000 feet underwater on the sea floor. Ultimately, the spill could grow much larger than the Valdez because Gulf of Mexico wells tap deposits that hold many times more oil than a single tanker.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was focusing on national wildlife refuges on a chain of barrier islands.

"We're trying to go for the ones where the pelicans are nesting right now," said Tom McKenzie, the agency's regional spokesman, adding that about 900 were on North Breton.

About 34,000 birds have been counted in the national refuges most at risk, McKenzie said. Gulls, pelicans, roseate spoonbills, egrets, shore birds, terns and blue herons are in the path of the spill.

Mink and river otter also live in the delta and might eat oiled carcasses, said Robert Love, head of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries' coastal and nongame division.

Bird rescuer Holcomb worked the Valdez disaster and was headed to Louisiana. He said some birds may avoid the oil spill, but others won't.

"These are experiences that the birds haven't encountered before," he said. "They might think it's seaweed. It's never harmed them before."

BP has requested more resources from the Defense Department, especially underwater equipment that might be better than what is commercially available. A BP executive said the corporation would "take help from anyone." That includes fishermen who could be hired to help deploy containment boom.

An emergency shrimping season was opened to allow shrimpers to scoop up their catch before it is fouled by oil.

This murky water and the oysters in it have provided a livelihood for three generations of Frank and Mitch Jurisich's family in Empire, La.

Now, on the open water just beyond the marshes, they can smell the oil that threatens everything they know and love.

"Just smelling it, it puts more of a sense of urgency, a sense of fear," Frank Jurisich said.

The brothers hope to get all the oysters they can sell before the oil washes ashore. They filled more than 100 burlap sacks Thursday and stopped to eat some oysters. "This might be our last day," Mitch Jurisich said.

Without the fishing industry, Frank Jurisich said the family "would be lost. This is who we are and what we do."


Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency so officials could begin preparing for the oil's impact. He also asked the federal government if he could call up 6,000 National Guard troops to help.

In Buras, La., where Hurricane Katrina made landfall in 2005, the owner of the Black Velvet Oyster Bar & Grill couldn't keep his eyes off the television. News and weather shows were making projections that oil would soon inundate the coastal wetlands where his family has worked since the 1860s.

"A hurricane is like closing your bank account for a few days, but this here has the capacity to destroy our bank accounts," said Byron Marinovitch, 47.

"We're really disgusted," he added. "We don't believe anything coming out of BP's mouth."

Mike Brewer, 40, who lost his oil spill response company in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina nearly five years ago, said the area was accustomed to the occasional minor spill. But he feared the scale of the escaping oil was beyond the capacity of existing resources.

"You're pumping out a massive amount of oil. There is no way to stop it," he said.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100430/ap_on_bi_ge/us_louisiana_oil_rig_explosion

[Nichi]

Already the spill has encompassed "three times" the area which was initially predicted, and the rescue effort for oil-laden shorebirds has begun. The news here is going to get progressively worse, while some politicians are engaging in deliberate minimization. BP Oil thus far is just scratchng their head.

The good news about a hurricane or an earthquake is that they both stop: an oil spill will keep going on and on, especially when the authorities determine "it can't be stopped". So if you're of a mind to do so, say a prayer for the birds and animals, and for the humans who will be rescuing them - or cleaning their remains. It's a heart-wrenching event.

Gulf Coast birds in danger
By Frank Gill, Special to CNN
April 30, 2010 5:46 p.m. EDT
 
Editor's note: Frank Gill, PhD., is interim president of Audubon. Frank was Audubon's chief scientist until his retirement in 2005, and has been a member of Audubon's national board of directors. He is the author of a textbook, "Ornithology," and more than 150 scientific and popular articles.

(CNN) -- Humans have always looked to birds for joy, inspiration and comfort, but if we look toward the birds of the Gulf Coast today, we feel no comfort, only a deep and growing unease.

What began on April 20 with the horrific loss of 11 human lives in the explosion of the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon now threatens to become a devastating and far-reaching environmental disaster -- one that should shake the American people to our very core.

Hour by hour, a massive oil slick is spreading to the fragile coastal wetlands and barrier islands of the Mississippi River Delta in Louisiana. Coastal areas of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida are also at risk.

Birds are key indicators of the environment in which they -- and we -- live and eat and breathe. Their health or decline eventually mirrors our own, and the diagnosis this week isn't looking very good.

The spreading oil threatens "Important Bird Areas," sites identified by Audubon and other conservation experts as vital to the health or even the survival of entire species.

Coastal bird species -- graceful terns, gangly pelicans, peaceful plovers -- have everything to lose if the oil reaches them. It is breeding season for these year-round coastal denizens, and it is also peak migration season for millions of other birds headed north, right through the areas that may be hardest hit.

A host of well-known species are at risk, among them:

• Brown pelicans, the state bird of Louisiana, are incubating eggs on barrier islands. The species was removed from the endangered species list late last year -- a victory to be sure -- but nevertheless faces an uncertain future.

• Reddish egret, a tall, colorful bird that "dances" wildly in the surf as it hunts for prey, is a scarce denizen of warm, salty coasts.

• Royal terns, and several of their relatives, nest on beaches and dunes and catch small fish by executing spectacular plunge-dives into the waters of the Gulf. But a dive into oily water could prove deadly for these beautiful creatures.

• Mottled ducks, locally called "summer ducks" because they are the only ducks that breed along the Gulf Coast, living, feeding and nesting in coastal salt marshes where oil would have devastating consequences.

• Seaside sparrows, tiny and secretive marsh birds, will have nowhere to go if the salt marsh edges they frequent are destroyed by oil. They would simply fade away.

Why does it matter if birds are in trouble? Like most Americans, I believe that living things have intrinsic worth and should be celebrated and allowed to thrive. They add beauty and wonder to our world. But if that doesn't convince you, consider this: If birds are in trouble, so are we.

The problem is simply too big to contain. Birds and marine life will die. Sensitive habitats will be damaged. Industries and families will suffer. Cleanup will cost billions and take months or even years. Long-term recovery is uncertain.

We commend the federal, state and industry personnel who are working long hours in difficult and dangerous conditions attempting to stop and contain the spill. However, everyone shares the sickening realization that even heroic efforts probably will not be enough to avert significant environmental damage.

This disaster confronts us squarely with the risks to which we expose ourselves and our environment any time we drill for oil. As a nation, we must stop and consider what we've done, and what we will do tomorrow.

We must pause and reflect on what places can truly be considered "safe" for oil extraction, having the courage to recognize that in some, the risks are simply too great and the resources too precious to spoil. Elected representatives must keep the picture of this spreading catastrophe in mind as they consider the path to our energy future.

America's energy needs are great. But so is our concern for the people and nature imperiled by our addiction to fossil fuel. It's time to redouble our efforts to move toward a future powered by cleaner, renewable sources of energy that make the planet a safer place for us and all the life with which we share it. The images from the Gulf are tragic reminders that we cannot afford to wait.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Frank Gill.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/04/30/gill.audubon.oil/index.html

(He was too gentle, heh.)

[Nichi]

Gulf oil spill swiftly balloons, could move east with the Jet Stream

[Michael]

Obama might have to dive in himself to satisfy Fox News.

It certainly is a grim event.