Wednesday, April 20, 2011

One Year Anniversary of the Gulf Oil Spill


Here's a roundup of news from today:

  • So do fishermen and local residents:


  • A growing body of evidence reveals that the massive release of oil combined with the unprecedented amount of chemical oil dispersants applied by BP is still an environmental threat a year later

  • CNN reports, "Some potential clues about the impact of the spill have made themselves known: dead baby dolphins and sea turtles; oiled brown pelicans; fish with strange sores; sticky marsh grasses; tar balls on beaches. … "

  • The Associated Press reported recently, some local governments have been using the $754 million in disaster payments from BP to buy iPads, SUVs, and laptops. Meanwhile, BP just gave another $30 million to Florida to help entice tourists onto its beaches this summer
  • The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement contracted the Norwegian firm Det Norske Veritas to conduct a forensic examination of the blowout preventer. The blind shear rams, which were supposed cut through and close off the well, failed because a pipe had buckled, the 551-page report concluded—a problem that casts doubt on all the other BOPs in use today
Only 17 months before BP's Deepwater Horizon rig suffered a deadly blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, another BP deepwater oil platform also blew out.
  • A former top oil industry executive says:
Today marks the first anniversary of the worst environmental catastrophe in the history of the US. Unfortunately, most Americans, including our politicians, are suffering from collective amnesia about that tragic event that cost 11 lives, destroyed thousands of jobs, polluted thousands of square miles of the Gulf of Mexico, and damaged the economies of 5 states. As tragic as all those events were (some are still ongoing), media attention has moved on to the Royal Wedding, the next earthquake, and, of course, breathless coverage of American Idol. At the same time, our politicians, especially those in Washington, have used the lack of media attention to not only abdicate their responsibilities to make offshore drilling safer and are actively working to make it less safe, shocking as that seems.
And see this.

1 comment:

  1. Well, people followed the protocol given them by the people responsible for the catastrophe and the men who wanted to be awarded and given money and a plane ride out of the country. They did what their government told them to do. Look what you got! Look and the damage to you and your life? Now, remember that for the next time, and then do what your 'gut' tells you to do. It will be the right thing. You must take control of what goes on in your own 'back yard'.

    ReplyDelete

→ Thank you for contributing to the conversation by commenting. We try to read all of the comments (but don't always have the time).

→ If you write a long comment, please use paragraph breaks. Otherwise, no one will read it. Many people still won't read it, so shorter is usually better (but it's your choice).

→ The following types of comments will be deleted if we happen to see them:

-- Comments that criticize any class of people as a whole, especially when based on an attribute they don't have control over

-- Comments that explicitly call for violence

→ Because we do not read all of the comments, I am not responsible for any unlawful or distasteful comments.