Stopping the Oil Spill

[DJD]

This is historic for all the wrong reasons. The map showing the oil mess is shocking and it moves with the winds and tide so who knows where the storms and mother nature will take this. I'm with you on this cause I don't see how this cannot be handled better. I'm thinking that if they would have attacked the problem with a stronger sense of an emergency to begin with we would have had a solution by now.

The thing stinks of a cover up in the beginning days with BP officials and our Gubment standing by and watching eachother on t.v.....seemed like noone would step up and take this problem by the horns. I'm just a tax paying man living in Lexington Kentucky watching the news and it seemed pretty **** important to me back when the accident happened. Why is it that BP looked so passive in the beginning? Why is it that the gubment was so willing to hide behind laws when they seldom do otherwise? This thing stunk bad from the start and everyone hoped the other guy would fix it or take the blame. Now here we are 45 days later and it's gonna take them all down now!

If these specialist and engineers took any time off since this started then they need to be dealt with...same goes for any of our gubment morons.

[smokefan]

Saw on the news that obama is going back to the gulf next week. He has some what grown a pair cause he is taking a bil for $69 million to give to bp. I wonder if he will stay more than 2 hours this time. This thing is totally out of control and I have a hard time believing that NO ONE has way to stop it. I know its bp's well but, in my opnion, the government should have stepped in and taken control. Mabe it wouldnt have helped but at least it would seem like someone was doing something. I agree with DJD something should have been done faster at the beggining of this mess, instead of bp and the "gubment" watching each other stick there thumbs in ther butt. Just my 2 cents.

[JD7.62]

I spent 10 1/2 hours on Pensacola Beach today. I counted at least 18 News trucks from places like Miama, Tampa, Atlanta...all over the south east. Oil is said to be about 10mi from P'cola beach and we are all worried about the economic and ecologic impact we are going to have in the region. I live in Navarre Beach now, about 15mi east of P'cola Beach. Ive been smelling the oil off and on for about two weeks, sometimes its so bad that it even stinks inside the house. Im not looking forward to this summer.

I am hoping that at the very least the bays and fragile ecosystems in them which are the nurseries for many of the game fish remain oil free. The beaches, IF the oil is stopped sooner then later, are easier to clean and could be fine come end of summer. At least Im trying to tell my self that.

[DJD]

I spent 10 1/2 hours on Pensacola Beach today. I counted at least 18 News trucks from places like Miama, Tampa, Atlanta...all over the south east. Oil is said to be about 10mi from P'cola beach and we are all worried about the economic and ecologic impact we are going to have in the region. I live in Navarre Beach now, about 15mi east of P'cola Beach. Ive been smelling the oil off and on for about two weeks, sometimes its so bad that it even stinks inside the house. Im not looking forward to this summer.

I am hoping that at the very least the bays and fragile ecosystems in them which are the nurseries for many of the game fish remain oil free. The beaches, IF the oil is stopped sooner then later, are easier to clean and could be fine come end of summer. At least Im trying to tell my self that.

10 1/2 hours on the beach? Are you mad? Seriously, I never considered the smell...that has to be so nasty you could taste it.

[bassin_bug]

I seem to remember that a bubble of methane got into the pipe and, as it came up toward the surface it made contact with other substances. The methane bubble increased in size as it came up and found an ignition source which caused the explosion. I don't know how a natural occurring gas like methane can be contained; if it could there wouldn't be so many deadly coal mine explosions.

Having been born and raised in a county that has many producing oil wells, I have seen them in all phases of drilling, pumping, and refining. Oil is not like water. When a water well is drilled the water just pours or is pumped out and that's all. On the other hand, oil is high density and is not a singular substance. Some oil pools have so much pressure that it will blow more than 100 ft. into the air when the oil is tapped. One rig that my brother-in-law was working on had the upper platform blown off the derrick when they tapped oil.

There are 6 oil wells and one small refinery within a mile and a half of my house in AL. On foggy mornings the smell of oil, sulphur, and natural gas hangs heavily in the air. Nobody complains because they are accustomed to it and it is not constant. It's like living in a city where there is a papermill; there is a distinct odor that lets you know a papermill is nearby.

I don't agree with the slack way BP is handling the crisis but I am not smart enough to develop a fix for the problem. I do know that blowing up the wellhead would only make matters worse. BP is offering some lucrative contracts to professionals but who knows if the people will ever get paid? I believe the contractors and environmentalists will have to go into litigation to get paid and that could take decades. Cleanup people are being paid $12 per hour and most of them receive no benefits.

[JD7.62]

Well I was actually on the beach pier fishing the whole time. Now, does that sound mad?

[bassin_bug]

They are drilling relief wells as we speak.

What really honks me off is that they are still putting profits and potential profits ahead of GETTING IT SEALED.

Destroy the wellhead, USE THERMITE, or whatever else you need to SEAL this MFER.....be done with it.

BP doesn't want to do that because they stand to lose Billions in potential revenues. The cleanup effort will cost significantly LESS, and they don't give a CRAP about our land.......PERIOD.

Later,

Geo

Geo, what are you thinking?!! Thermite is a mixture of aluminum and iron oxide (isn't that rust) that requires considerable heat (4,000 degrees) to ignite. It will burn through anything in seconds. Do not try to extinguish a thermite reaction using WATER. When you have CAREFULLY selected your site, it is safest to let it burn.

Considering the under water location of the wellhead, the cold water temperature at 5,000 ft. depth, and that Thermite will burn through ANYTHING, wouldn't that produce still more problems? If it were possible to use Thermite, I can't imagine what would happen with something burning at 4,000 degrees with oil gushing out over it.

[Grumpy]

Bug, Geo and the rest think that BP doesn;t want to destroy the wellhead because BP wants to keep using the well after it is capped. As you said, blowiing up the well head, by whatever means, will cause more problems than it would help but they don;t understand, or don;t want to understand that. I don;t have any connection to any Oil Company, not even any investments, but I firmly believe that BP is doing its best to stop the flow of oil. It just happens to be much more complicated than hitting the wellhead with thermite or a nuke to dam it up.

Grumpy

[Tim_T]

After reading the article and then the comments following the story, my gut tells me this quote was taken out of context. The comments are just about as bad as the implied context of the quote.

I didn't get that it was taken out of context, but perhaps you are right. I also find it ironic that a BP exec would says that when people can say "there are other places to buy gas besides BP!"

[Chubminnow]

Just curious to know if any places sell BP gas besides BP? Like Thorntons and Swifty, are these two companies BP brands or directly related to BP somehow? Kind of thinkin' I don't want to purcahse BP gas knowingly or unknowingly either one.

[mhall]

Lord knows Oil companies are'nt greedy, what was I thinking. I still say they looked at the lesser of two evils, the path those chose is the one they feel will eventually be the cheapest. Just this ole dummies opinion. I have and will continue to buy gas somewhere other then BP.

[psprowler]

I didn't get that it was taken out of context, but perhaps you are right. I also find it ironic that a BP exec would says that when people can say "there are other places to buy gas besides BP!"

My negative bias towards the media grows a bit every day and should be noted. Instead of giving people the most factual information possible, I feel with the plethora of media outlets they are all competing to: 1. Be the first to report and 2. Be the one to get the big reaction.

To me, the above has a higher probability than a high level BP exec spouting off one of the most distasteful comments possible for time and place. That's my thought process here.

As an aside, I'm surprised gas prices haven't risen due to all this. After all it is a rather unique excuse and not one in the normal bag.