Gulf Coast Oil Spill

[maryscuba]

Does anyone know the status? Is there any relief anytime soon? This things has dragged on forever:-(

 

[FrogManMike]

Ya the well is still leaking thousands of barrels a day.

 

[_Remko_]

But not in the gulf, the 1979 gulf spill off the coast of Mexico is still the biggest in the gulf and the world. The latest one may or my not exceed it, most likely it won't.
I was diving the Louisiana gulf oil rigs in 1979 and that spill had no effect here.
NetDoc is right, if you listen to the national media you would think there is no water just oil in the gulf.

Actually the 1910 Lakeview Gusher is considered the largest, second is gulf war in 1991 and third place is for the Deepwater horizon. It's almost impossible to get an accurate number on the actual flow.

Nature has a nice recovery mechanism but I honestly think we should stop testing the limits of that. At some point it won't be able to keep up with our ways.

The fact that nature has a way of recovering doesn't mean it doesn't have a large impact on wildlife. The human species also recovers from atomic boms, genocide and war but it doesn't mean it has no impact. So we shouldn't mistake recovery with impact.

I agree with you that media should be taken with a grain of salt, but let's not continue to expect nature to recover from our mess and start being more considerate. Afterall future generations will have to live with the outcome.

The fact that we still don't really know how to have an acurate way to measure these leaks and havn't been able to create new methods of containment since spills in the late 70s (The BOP failed in Ixtoc, then there was the dispersant, junkshot and finally the relief well) to me means we still have some catching up to do in the learning departement.

 

[captain]

Some history,

Petroleum History Resources: Offshore Oil History

 

[captain]

It appears as the reason the BOP did not close has been found. Two drill pipes were found in the cut off section of riser when there should only have been one.
Speculation is that most likely a section of drill pipe broke apart during the explosion and fell down into the BOP besides the one already there or a section of drill pipe broke down the well and was ejected up into the BOP which resulted in the BOP shear ram not having enough force to cut through both pipes.