Is There Another Leak in the Gulf?

According to a report on Business Insider:

Is there a separate Gulf oil leak at Platform #23051?

Satellite analysis blog SkyTruth has identified what looks like oil discharge coming from a rig located a few mile from the Mississippi Delta. Analyst John Amos asks readers for any information on the possible second leak.

This rig is owned by Taylor Energy, according to an MMS database. We have contacted the firm and are waiting for comment.

We just picked up the phone and called Taylor Energy ourselves. Whoever answered the phone (she identified herself only by saying "I just answer the phone") refused to comment on or deny the suggestions made by Business Insider.

When asked "Is there anyone else we can talk to?" she curtly replied, "No. They're all gone for the day."

"But dont they have cellphones?" I wondered. "Surely there's a number you can give me to reach someone else."

"No."

"Will there be a statement on this matter tomorrow, or in the near future?"

"No."

Now, it could well be that the initial reports of a possible leak are incorrect, exagerrated, or overblown. We're only inquiring about what their reaction is to the Business Insider and SkyTruth stories. But it's interesting that whoever answered the phone would not deny that such a leak existed.

Animal Photos BP Doesn't Want You To See

Images above from here. Images below from here.

James Cameron on BP: "Morons"

Avatar director James Cameron, an expert in underwater robotics and video, said Wednesday that BP has rejected his offer to help. From nydailynews.com:

"Over the last few weeks, I've watched, as we all have, with growing horror and heartache, watching what's happening in the Gulf and thinking those morons don't know what they're doing," Cameron said at the All Things Digital tech conference.

Cameron has done extensive work with robot submarines and underwater filming in his movies.

Earlier in the day he attended a conference with the Environmental Protection Agency and pushed to have the government get its own independent look at the leak.

"If you're not monitoring it independently, you're asking the perpetrator to give you the video of the crime scene," Cameron said.

Congressman Markey Condemns BP

Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., chairman of the House energy committee investigating the BP oil disaster, told CBS he now has no faith left in BP to make the catastrophic undersea gusher stop:

"I have no confidence whatsoever in BP. I think that they do not know what they are doing. They started off talking about golf balls going in as a junk shot. People thought they would be dependent on MIT or Cal Tech instead of the PGA and golf balls. That was in the first couple of weeks. So I don't think that people should really believe what BP is saying in terms of the likelihood of anything that they're doing is going to turn out as they're predicting," he said.

BP's "Top Kill" Fails

From Climate Progress:

Three attempts to pump mud and 16 tries to stuff solid material into a breached Gulf of Mexico oil well failed to stop the flow, top BP executives said Saturday, and engineers and executives with the oil giant have decided to “move on to the next option.”

That option is a vaguely-defined cap called the "Lower Marine Riser Package". How is it different from the previous dome they tried to cap the leak with? They didn't say.

As the mood gets progressively grimmer in the Gulf, some voices have begun to express fear that the relief well - something BP says is the only permanent solution - may not even be able to make it stop. We won't know until August, when BP plans to put such a well in place.

PBS: Live Video Feed From BP

Leak Supposedly Stopped, Now Raging Again

At 10:29am EDT today, Yahoo News reported that BP had successfully stopped the oil leak, but cautioned it was still too early to declare victory. Apparently that caveat was indeed a prudent one, because as of this writing - 1:57pm EDT - the gusher is still going on strong as ever, as seen on the live cam. It does, however, look somewhat muddier than before. BP chief executive Tony Hayward said that it would be at least 24 hours before officials know whether the attempt has been successful.


The company intends to eventually inject cement into the well to permanently seal it. Just how they intend to accomplish this is not certain, since cement's failure to hold back the powerful pressure of the gusher is precisely what caused this disaster in the first place.

The mud-pumping technique being used is explained here on Reuters.

Cousteau Takes Hazmat Dive Into Oil, Reports Corexit Isn't Working

Click here to see a disturbing video of Phillipe Cousteau Jr. and Sam Champion donning Hazmat diving suits and surveying the scene underwater at the BP oil disaster.

The Corexit chemical dispersant being used heavily by BP (against the EPA's orders to scale it down) is not dispersing the oil, the divers found. The Corexit is only combining the oil into small globules, making the situation even worse.

"A lot of people are saying when you apply the chemical dispersant, it disappears, the oil goes away," Champion said. "This is evidence that doesn't happen."

Is BP Trying to Cover Up New Activity at Disaster Site?

At about 7:00pm EST, the BP live cam showed a sudden explosive occurrence - possibly two - taking place at the leak site, with the amount of oil increasing rapidly and the color of the outflow changing to a lighter hue.

The camera was quickly cut to a different shot, one that showed a higher-up view of the plume but actually only further illustrated the extremely volatile change that had just occurred. Then it settled on an angle with the view obstructed by another piece of robotic equipment.


By 7:30 the live cam relay had switched to a menu showing multiple monitor feeds, and shortly thereafter CNN pulled the feed entirely and switched to coverage of the Senate floor.


As of this writing - 7:44pm EST - the link to the live cam has vanished from CNN's front page. However, by following the old bookmarked link, the live cam is back online as of at least 7:49pm. The current shot is taken from a greater distance, and if you compare the relative size of the pipe and the plume to screenshots from days past, it's evident the plume is much larger now and seemingly flowing harder.

Gulf Residents Reporting Smell of Oil

From USA Today:

Some Gulf residents say they smell the deep sea oil from the Gulf of Mexico spill.

"It's chemical, and I'm trying not to think about it," Raymond Dillon, a New Orleans resident told the New York Times.

People in Bay St. Louis, Waveland and Gulfport, Miss., have also reported a petroleum stench, according to McLatchy Newspapers. The smell can pop up anywhere along the Coast, depending on the wind, the story says.

The air quality remains safe, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. More than 800 air samples are being tested daily.

Tar balls were found on the beach at Port Fourchon, Louisiana wildlife officials said Friday.

U.S. Government Tries to Avoid Public Panic Over BP's Disaster

Wayne Madsen has a sobering and shocking article about BP and the Obama administration's attempts to prevent mass panic by downplaying the true nature of the ongoing Deepwater Horizon disaster. An excerpt follows:

Plans by BP to sink a 4-story containment dome over the oil gushing from a gaping chasm one kilometer below the surface of the Gulf, where the oil rig Deepwater Horizon exploded and killed 11 workers on April 20, and reports that one of the leaks has been contained is pure public relations disinformation designed to avoid panic and demands for greater action by the Obama administration, according to FEMA and Corps of Engineers sources. Sources within these agencies say the White House has been resisting releasing any "damaging information" about the oil disaster. They add that if the ocean oil geyser is not stopped within 90 days, there will be irreversible damage to the marine eco-systems of the Gulf of Mexico, north Atlantic Ocean, and beyond. At best, some Corps of Engineers experts say it could take two years to cement the chasm on the floor of the Gulf.

The Obama administration also conspired with BP to fudge the extent of the oil leak, according to our federal and state sources. After the oil rig exploded and sank, the government stated that 42,000 gallons per day was gushing from the seabed chasm. Five days later, the federal government upped the leakage to 210,000 gallons a day.

However, WMR has been informed that submersibles that are monitoring the escaping oil from the Gulf seabed are viewing television pictures of what is a "volcanic-like" eruption of oil. Moreover, when the Army Corps of Engineers first attempted to obtain NASA imagery of the Gulf oil slick -- which is larger than that being reported by the media -- it was turned down. However, National Geographic managed to obtain the satellite imagery shots of the extent of the disaster and posted them on their web site.

There is other satellite imagery being withheld by the Obama administration that shows what lies under the gaping chasm spewing oil at an ever-alarming rate is a cavern estimated to be around the size of Mount Everest. This information has been given an almost national security-level classification to keep it from the public, according to our sources.

The figure of 200,000 gallons a day is, in itself, also a fabrication. Many reputable news sources - including The Independent in the UK - now place the rate of spewage around 1,000,000 gallons a day, and even that figure is probably underestimating the true amount.

Chevron Begins Deep Drilling in Newfoundland

You'd think the current global disaster incurred by BP drilling too deeply for oil would have taught Chevron something. But they seem unable or unwilling to heed the lesson: they're actually going forward with plans to do deep drilling in Newfoundland, according to CBC.

And since the temperature in Newfoundland is far more freezing cold than that which BP engineers encountered at 5000 ft. in the Gulf of Mexico, a catastrophic oil leak could be even more unfixable. BP's attempt to cover the leak with a hastily-contrived dome failed because of the extreme cold, as well as the extreme pressure.

But scientist Bill Montevecchi says Chevron's plan is unsound.

Chevron plans to drill in 2,600 metres of water, or more than a kilometre deeper than the Deepwater Horizon project off Louisiana, where thousands of barrels of oil have spewed daily since an April 20 rupture and explosion.

Bill Montevecchi, a Memorial University seabird researcher, questions whether the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board — which regulates the oil industry — even knows enough about the offshore to protect the environment.

"We're about to charge ahead and assume we have a safety regime in place that's adequate, when in fact we've never had an independent observer on a platform," Montevecchi said.

Montevecchi said there should be a moratorium on deepsea drilling off Newfoundland until much stronger environmental safety rules are in place.