Gulf coast

[doitright]

Well I was going to the Gulf coast for vacation but not now. I would love to support them even with the oil spill but grandson has breathing problems. I just will not chance it.
I think they are making a mess down there. They are spraying dispersant into the oil as it comes out. That is like when Oregon Hwy Dept. exploded a wale in 1970 to get rid of it. All it did is cause them to clean up a larger area. This is going to change life and the economy for years and years to come. Another way to look at it is all up and down the Mississippi River cities dump sewage in the river. Catfish is a bottom feeder and I will not eat river catfish. They figure the amount of sewage they can dump in the river by PPM by the flow of the river not PPM at the bottom of the river where the fish eat.
Sorry for the rant.
Just a thought can they not put something in the oil to make it into tar balls instead trying to thin it trying to get it where you can not see it?
I pray for the people of the total Gulf Coast.

[caseydog]

If you take the time to do some research, it is rather incredible the number of ways we humans are fouling the oceans. Whether it's accidental oil spills, or intensional dumping, all kinds of human-created "stuff" goes into the water, and ends up in the oceans.

That floating mass of plastic waste in the Pacific is now larger than the State of Texas. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Paci ... bage_Patch

It seems to me that with just a little bit of effort, we could manage to live well without making so much of a mess of our oceans. But, like the saying goes, the first step to solving a problem is to realize there is one. We humans are pretty good at denial.

CD

[dakotamouse]

I saw a report on this on some tv program. This picture doesn't come close to showing how hideous this problem is and it is so preventable. Put trash where it belongs. Not where it can wash into a river which flows into the ocean.

[Dean in Eureka, CA]

BP has single handedly wrecked the Gulf & the Gulf Coast and I think it's going to affect the oceans on a global level, which spells trouble for the entire planet.
Every BP exec, Transocean exec and permitting govt. person involved in the process, which led up to this disaster should be jailed for life.
Welcome To The New Dead Sea... Gulf of Mexico.

The President had better follow through with his "Kick Ass" and make them pay every cent due for clean-up, lost income and livelyhood to the fine folks of the Gulf Coast.

[Oasis Maker]

One of the most effective and appropriate ad campaigns ever. It's been almost 40 years since that single tear fell, and not a damn thing has changed.

Scott

[doitright]

One of the most effective and appropriate ad campaigns ever. It's been almost 40 years since that single tear fell, and not a damn thing has changed.

Scott

Boy it has been that long 40 years it was a good ad as I can recall made you think.

doitright

[robfisher]

Don't get me wrong. I loved it then and I still love it today but if it was "one of the most effective campaigns ever" why do you say nothing has changed? If nothing has changed it was not effective.

I see all sorts of change. Our highway litter, which that campaign really got at, is much less today than then. Our air is cleaner and are waterways much improved. No, we are not where we need to be by a long shot. But saying nothing has changed is not the answer.

We can all make change. We can all use a little less. Things that make a difference can be quite personal. We didn't use air conditioning last year and don't plan on it again this year. We choose to drive less. Simple things like growing and making our own food saves huge quantities of packaging. When I see the piles of trash every week on trash day I cringe. Our family produces one small can a week while others on the block have three cans every week. Eating locally grown and organic makes a difference.

The change may not be what we all want it to be but don't give up. Keep doing the right things. Convince your neighbor to do the right thing.

You hit a hot button.

[Corwin C]

+1 robfisher ...

[Oasis Maker]

Don't get me wrong. I loved it then and I still love it today but if it was "one of the most effective campaigns ever" why do you say nothing has changed? If nothing has changed it was not effective.

I see all sorts of change. Our highway litter, which that campaign really got at, is much less today than then. Our air is cleaner and are waterways much improved. No, we are not where we need to be by a long shot. But saying nothing has changed is not the answer.

We can all make change. We can all use a little less. Things that make a difference can be quite personal. We didn't use air conditioning last year and don't plan on it again this year. We choose to drive less. Simple things like growing and making our own food saves huge quantities of packaging. When I see the piles of trash every week on trash day I cringe. Our family produces one small can a week while others on the block have three cans every week. Eating locally grown and organic makes a difference.

The change may not be what we all want it to be but don't give up. Keep doing the right things. Convince your neighbor to do the right thing.

You hit a hot button.

Well I guess one word and its misinterpretation apparently can derail an entire larger point with my simple statement and post, so perhaps I should be more specific. By "effective" concerning a public service (message) commercial, I mean a commercial that is highly memorable even to this day, one that has/had a great emotional impact and resonates with the viewers, and a delivery that was exceptionally conceived. On this basis, viewers consistently rate this commercial as one of the "best" ad campaigns ever created, and that conclusion was not based on the end result of some environmental impact study.

As far as me saying not a damn thing has changed, that is directly attributed to this threads subject and the oil spill in the Gulf, and in that .... NOT A DAMN THING HAS CHANGED. We continue to have these horrific oil spills that pollute our waters, and as if that isn't bad enough, we are using the exact same, outdated, ineffective techniques to try and contain it and clean it up. The facts speak for themselves. The big oil companies are not doing anything different today vs. 30 years ago. Click below and give a listen:

Click Here---->Oil Spills Then Are Oil Spills Now

Or maybe you can run through the following list and point out where this tremendous change that you speak of occcurs? I can't seem to find it.

(One thing we agree - Yes, you did hit a hot button.)

Scott

Oil Spills and Disasters

The following list includes major oil spills since 1967. The circumstances surrounding the spill, amount of oil spilled, and the attendant environmental damage is also given.



1967
March 18, Cornwall, Eng.: Torrey Canyon ran aground, spilling 38 million gallons of crude oil off the Scilly Islands.
1976
Dec. 15, Buzzards Bay, Mass.: Argo Merchant ran aground and broke apart southeast of Nantucket Island, spilling its entire cargo of 7.7 million gallons of fuel oil.
1977
April, North Sea: blowout of well in Ekofisk oil field leaked 81 million gallons.
1978
March 16, off Portsall, France: wrecked supertanker Amoco Cadiz spilled 68 million gallons, causing widespread environmental damage over 100 mi of Brittany coast.
1979
June 3, Gulf of Mexico: exploratory oil well Ixtoc 1 blew out, spilling an estimated 140 million gallons of crude oil into the open sea. Although it is one of the largest known oil spills, it had a low environmental impact.
July 19, Tobago: the Atlantic Empress and the Aegean Captain collided, spilling 46 million gallons of crude. While being towed, the Atlantic Empress spilled an additional 41 million gallons off Barbados on Aug. 2.
1980
March 30, Stavanger, Norway: floating hotel in North Sea collapsed, killing 123 oil workers.
1983
Feb. 4, Persian Gulf, Iran: Nowruz Field platform spilled 80 million gallons of oil.
Aug. 6, Cape Town, South Africa: the Spanish tanker Castillo de Bellver caught fire, spilling 78 million gallons of oil off the coast.
1988
July 6, North Sea off Scotland: 166 workers killed in explosion and fire on Occidental Petroleum's Piper Alpha rig in North Sea; 64 survivors. It is the world's worst offshore oil disaster.
Nov. 10, Saint John's, Newfoundland: Odyssey spilled 43 million gallons of oil.
1989
March 24, Prince William Sound, Alaska: tanker Exxon Valdez hit an undersea reef and spilled 10 million–plus gallons of oil into the water, causing the worst oil spill in U.S. history.
Dec. 19, off Las Palmas, the Canary Islands: explosion in Iranian supertanker, the Kharg-5, caused 19 million gallons of crude oil to spill into Atlantic Ocean about 400 mi north of Las Palmas, forming a 100-square-mile oil slick.
1990
June 8, off Galveston, Tex.: Mega Borg released 5.1 million gallons of oil some 60 nautical miles south-southeast of Galveston as a result of an explosion and subsequent fire in the pump room.
1991
Jan. 23–27, southern Kuwait: during the Persian Gulf War, Iraq deliberately released 240–460 million gallons of crude oil into the Persian Gulf from tankers 10 mi off Kuwait. Spill had little military significance. On Jan. 27, U.S. warplanes bombed pipe systems to stop the flow of oil.
April 11, Genoa, Italy: Haven spilled 42 million gallons of oil in Genoa port.
May 28, Angola: ABT Summer exploded and leaked 15–78 million gallons of oil off the coast of Angola. It's not clear how much sank or burned.
1992
March 2, Fergana Valley, Uzbekistan: 88 million gallons of oil spilled from an oil well.
1993
Aug. 10, Tampa Bay, Fla.: three ships collided, the barge Bouchard B155, the freighter Balsa 37, and the barge Ocean 255. The Bouchard spilled an estimated 336,000 gallons of No. 6 fuel oil into Tampa Bay.
1994
Sept. 8, Russia: dam built to contain oil burst and spilled oil into Kolva River tributary. U.S. Energy Department estimated spill at 2 million barrels. Russian state-owned oil company claimed spill was only 102,000 barrels.
1996
Feb. 15, off Welsh coast: supertanker Sea Empress ran aground at port of Milford Haven, Wales, spewed out 70,000 tons of crude oil, and created a 25-mile slick.
1999
Dec. 12, French Atlantic coast: Maltese-registered tanker Erika broke apart and sank off Britanny, spilling 3 million gallons of heavy oil into the sea.
2000
Jan. 18, off Rio de Janeiro: ruptured pipeline owned by government oil company, Petrobras, spewed 343,200 gallons of heavy oil into Guanabara Bay.
Nov. 28, Mississippi River south of New Orleans: oil tanker Westchester lost power and ran aground near Port Sulphur, La., dumping 567,000 gallons of crude oil into lower Mississippi. Spill was largest in U.S. waters since Exxon Valdez disaster in March 1989.
2002
Nov. 13, Spain: Prestige suffered a damaged hull and was towed to sea and sank. Much of the 20 million gallons of oil remains underwater.
2003
July 28, Pakistan: The Tasman Spirit, a tanker, ran aground near the Karachi port, and eventually cracked into two pieces. One of its four oil tanks burst open, leaking 28,000 tons of crude oil into the sea.
2004
Dec. 7, Unalaska, Aleutian Islands, Alaska: A major storm pushed the M/V Selendang Ayu up onto a rocky shore, breaking it in two. 337,000 gallons of oil were released, most of which was driven onto the shoreline of Makushin and Skan Bays.
2005
Aug.-Sept., New Orleans, Louisiana: The Coast Guard estimated that more than 7 million gallons of oil were spilled during Hurricane Katrina from various sources, including pipelines, storage tanks and industrial plants.
2006
June 19, Calcasieu River, Louisiana: An estimated 71,000 barrels of waste oil were released from a tank at the CITGO Refinery on the Calcasieu River during a violent rain storm.
July 15, Beirut, Lebanon: The Israeli navy bombs the Jieh coast power station, and between three million and ten million gallons of oil leaks into the sea, affecting nearly 100 miles of coastline. A coastal blockade, a result of the war, greatly hampers outside clean-up efforts.
August 11th, Guimaras island, The Philippines: A tanker carrying 530,000 gallons of oil sinks off the coast of the Philippines, putting the country's fishing and tourism industries at great risk. The ship sinks in deep water, making it virtually unrecoverable, and it continues to emit oil into the ocean as other nations are called in to assist in the massive clean-up effort.
2007
December 7, South Korea: Oil spill causes environmental disaster, destroying beaches, coating birds and oysters with oil, and driving away tourists with its stench. The Hebei Spirit collides with a steel wire connecting a tug boat and barge five miles off South Korea's west coast, spilling 2.8 million gallons of crude oil. Seven thousand people are trying to clean up 12 miles of oil-coated coast.
2008
July 25, New Orleans, Louisiana: A 61-foot barge, carrying 419,000 gallons of heavy fuel, collides with a 600-foot tanker ship in the Mississippi River near New Orleans. Hundreds of thousands of gallons of fuel leak from the barge, causing a halt to all river traffic while cleanup efforts commence to limit the environmental fallout on local wildlife.
2009
March 11, Queensland, Australia: During Cyclone Hamish, unsecured cargo aboard the container ship MV Pacific Adventurer came loose on deck and caused the release of 52,000 gallons of heavy fuel and 620 tons of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer, into the Coral Sea. About 60 km of the Sunshine Coast was covered in oil, prompting the closure of half the area's beaches.
2010
Jan. 23, Port Arthur, Texas: The oil tanker Eagle Otome and a barge collide in the Sabine-Neches Waterway, causing the release of about 462,000 gallons of crude oil. Environmental damage was minimal as about 46,000 gallons were recovered and 175,000 gallons were dispersed or evaporated, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
April 24, Gulf of Mexico: The Deepwater Horizon, a semi-submersible drilling rig, sank on April 22, after an April 20th explosion on the vessel. Eleven people died in the blast. When the rig sank, the riser—the 5,000-foot-long pipe that connects the wellhead to the rig—became detached and began leaking oil. In addition, U.S. Coast Guard investigators discovered a leak in the wellhead itself. As much as 25,000 barrels (1,050,000 gallons) of oil per day were leaking into the water, threatening wildlife along the Louisiana Coast. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano declared it a "spill of national significance." BP (British Petroleum), which leased the Deepwater Horizon, is responsible for the cleanup, but the U.S. Navy supplied the company with resources to help contain the slick. Oil reached the Louisiana shore on April 30, affected about 125 miles of coast. By early June, oil had also reached Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi. It is the largest oil spill in U.S. history.

[Sparksalot]

The following list includes major oil spills since 1967. The circumstances surrounding the spill, amount of oil spilled, and the attendant environmental damage is also given.

If you're gonna slam the USA, you might want to just include US spills, not foreign ones.

BP has single handedly wrecked the Gulf & the Gulf Coast and I think it's going to affect the oceans on a global level, which spells trouble for the entire planet.
Every BP exec, Transocean exec and permitting govt. person involved in the process, which led up to this disaster should be jailed for life.

Regarding "blame", BP is just the one one left holding the bag. The cause? Decades of government intervention and control motivated by however well meaning causes which have forced the wells farther off shore into ever deeper water.

On good old dry ground this whole thing would have been over in a matter of days.

[dakotamouse]

Everyone is angry about this so it is going to be hard to keep this civil.

There are somewhere around 700 drilling platforms in the gulf. This is the only disastor. That doesn't make it any less of a really bad thing.

From what I've been reading BP had missed a number of inspections on this rig. I want to know why.

People were on Obama's butt from the beginning saying he should be doing more...............I wasn't sure what they meant by more. What was he supposed to do? Jump in the water with a pair of swim fins, duct tape and a cork?

Last night I learned that 3 days after the wreck the Dutch offered a ship with an oil boom to help control the oil. They weren't the only country to offer help. The government refused this help. I want to know why. With all the aid we have given the world why was the help of others turned away?

I heard that Rosie O'Donnel wants the president to "Nationalize" BP. Meaning that the government should seize control of the company. I wonder how the British would feel about the US taking a British Company. Would they consider it an act of war? Especially since so many British Citizens own stock in the company and it is part of their retirement portfolio.

What a mess.

[Oasis Maker]

The following list includes major oil spills since 1967. The circumstances surrounding the spill, amount of oil spilled, and the attendant environmental damage is also given.

If you're gonna slam the USA, you might want to just include US spills, not foreign ones.

Your "mis"point only makes mine stronger. In no way do you read USA only in my post, or me "slamming the USA", do you? My assessment with these inadequate patterns demonstrated by the oil companies are GLOBAL - just as I posted and just as I intended.

If you're going to critique what's written - fine, but don't just make it up as you go along.

Also, if you are using multiple quotes in your post, it would be considerate to identify what's what and attribute each quote to the members name that wrote it. Your second "unnamed" quote did not come from me, but appears so.

Scott

[Larwyn]

I too feel a great loss at what is happening to the Gulf. It could well be one of the most widespread disasters for Americans in our lifetime and it makes me very sad. But;

You would think that BP intentionally set out to destroy the Gulf of Mexico. It also sounds like everybody thinks they knows better than BP, how to clean up the mess. If everybody who has never tried to remove a drop crude oil from a tub of seawater would shut up, get out of the way, and let the peopled who know what they are doing do it the way they know how to do it, everybody would be better off.

If someone actually has a better way of handling the situation, I'm sure BP would not stand between them and that well. In fact, I'm sure they would be happy to pack their bags and go home, just let Obama, the press, the angry public and Rosie O'Donnel fix the situation. I think there's a better chance of John Wayne coming back from the grave, paddling out to the well in a birch bark canoe, calling the leak "Pilgrim" and then sitting back with a bottle of whisky while laughing and watching all that oil retreat cowardly back into the earth from which it came before the sun has fully set.

I have never before noticed a time when so many who knew so little about a subject were so critical of those who do know. They are beating the very ones who can help the most into the ground. If you really want to know who is ultimately responsible, it is each and every one of us who own anything with a gas tank on it, or plugs into the wall. Do not even mention solar, wind, coal and hydro power, none of them could exist as we know them without the petroleum products used during production and actual operation.

Whether the spill was due to procedure failure, equipment failure, system failure, or whatever, it was not some evil plan by BP. If you can help or take over and do a better job, get out there and do it, if not, why not just stay out of the way of those who can?

More than once, I have been in an electrical substation during a power outage, for the sole purpose of restoring power as soon as possible. Standing there with a multimeter in one hand and a telephone in the other with an angry city manager, utility director, or some other self important "big shot" demanding that I get the power back on right NOW. My standard answer was always; "Well, unless you know what the problem is, I am not going to be able to fix it while I am on this phone." I always found "angry encouragement" more of a distraction than an aid in getting the job done.

These are just my thoughts on the situation, I am not trying to change your own.

[caseydog]

We can all make change. We can all use a little less. Things that make a difference can be quite personal. We didn't use air conditioning last year and don't plan on it again this year. We choose to drive less. Simple things like growing and making our own food saves huge quantities of packaging. When I see the piles of trash every week on trash day I cringe. Our family produces one small can a week while others on the block have three cans every week. Eating locally grown and organic makes a difference.

Whenever I hear someone say something extreme like, "What are we supposed to do, give up driving and live in caves," I always TRY to tell them just what you are saying -- if every person made a small change in how they live, the cumulative effect could be enormous.

And, I agree, things are better. Rivers in the US don't catch fire anymore. But, some things have gotten worse. We waste more oil on plastic bottles today, and drive a whole lot more than we need to.

BTW, litter along the roads in Texas is still a problem. Some people just don't get it -- take the McDonalds bag home and put it in the trash!

CD

[Oasis Maker]

We can all make change. We can all use a little less. Things that make a difference can be quite personal. We didn't use air conditioning last year and don't plan on it again this year. We choose to drive less. Simple things like growing and making our own food saves huge quantities of packaging. When I see the piles of trash every week on trash day I cringe. Our family produces one small can a week while others on the block have three cans every week. Eating locally grown and organic makes a difference.

Whenever I hear someone say something extreme like, "What are we supposed to do, give up driving and live in caves," I always TRY to tell them just what you are saying -- if every person made a small change in how they live, the cumulative effect could be enormous.

And, I agree, things are better. Rivers in the US don't catch fire anymore. But, some things have gotten worse. We waste more oil on plastic bottles today, and drive a whole lot more than we need to.

BTW, litter along the roads in Texas is still a problem. Some people just don't get it -- take the McDonalds bag home and put it in the trash!

CD

Yes, and I think as been clearly demonstrated with our economy, nothing happens in a vacuum. That goes for the environment as well. All considerations and "impacts" in the long run, are global in scale.

Scott