Mystery Yacht Washes Up In Florida

An empty yacht, with the engine was still running and its lights still on, washed up ashore in the Madeira Beach area yesterday around 1pm EST.

From CNN:

The Coast Guard sent out two rescue vessels and a helicopter but was not able to locate anybody.

Adding to the mystery is the fact that the vessel is registered to the federal government, CNN-affiliate WFTS reported.

Deputies from the Pinellas County Sheriff's office are investigating the incident and trying to track down the owner of the boat.

22-Mile-Long Plume Discovered

Scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute have discovered a plume of oil under the surface of the Ocean spanning 22 miles long. The oil, apparently driven below the surface by BP's heavy application of Corexit dispersant in the Gulf, is not breaking down.

This completely contradicts what BP and the U.S. Government have been telling us about the amount of oil still in the Ocean; it wasn't long ago that both parties were telling us that the oil had somehow magically disappeared and that citizens should go back to business as usual, go swimming, and eat seafood again.

This all comes at the same time as three reports that further debunk the official myth that the Gulf is all cleaned up:

Scientists from the University of Georgia have now gone on record as estimating that about 3/4 of the oil from the BP disaster is still there, it's just hidden below the surface.

Meanwhile, the University of South Florida has announced they've found oil coalescing in the underwater Desoto canyon - at levels toxic to marine life. David Hollander, a chemical oceanographer at USF, told CNN that "small larval fish see these droplets as food so they’re ingesting pure oil".

And finally, the Guardian is reporting that "Ian MacDonald, an oceanographer at Florida State University, said the White House accounting for the oil is misleading and that only 10% of the oil that spewed into the Gulf has been removed from the ocean."

The BP "Blue Flu" - Exaggeration or Epidemic?

A lot of mysterious and severe health problems have been reported among the BP disaster cleanup workers, and among others who have come too close to the oil, the Corexit, or both. What is happening here? Is it something more than just ordinary exposure to crude oil?

Many believe that what we're seeing here are cases of "TILT" (Toxicant-Induced Loss of Tolerance). Two weeks ago, southernstudies.org reported:

Regardless of whether the illness being reported in Gulf cleanup workers and residents ends up being confirmed as TILT, the fact remains that the chemicals people are being exposed to in the oil and dispersants are known to have health impacts including eye, skin and respiratory irritation, as well as headaches, dizziness, weakness, nausea and confusion. An analysis of EPA air testing data has found levels of these chemicals in coastal communities exceeding safety standards.

As of this week, the Louisiana Department of Health has documented 109 reports of illnesses among residents exposed to the spill, with 74 of those complaints coming from cleanup workers, according to ProPublica. In Alabama, another 19 cases of illness have been reported among people exposed to chemicals in the spill.

Now, another set of symptoms are being reported online, and a new name is being circulated: the "Blue Flu", or the "BP Flu". Apparently this story broke on a website called World Vision Portal, with someone called "Gnosty" giving a firsthand account of something potentially even more frightening than TILT.

"Gnosty" reports that locals in Florida are complaining of "migraine headaches, eye aches, joint aches, ear aches, severe coughing bouts, fevers, vomiting, and swollen glands (especially in the neck)", as well as "severe symptomatic cyanosis. These rapidly increasing symptoms range from bluish lip color to numbness in fingers and toes." He adds:

I have been interviewing family and friends who live along the Gulf of Mexico coast in Louisiana and Mississippi. Many of them had been working on shrimp boats before May 1, 2010 and a cousin is a shrimp boat owner. I have also spoken at length with two RN's working at a Gulf coast Emergency Room and an Emergency Clinic who are close family friends. I am basing what follows on their observations and knowledge along with my own personal research...

The oil and gas from the Biloxi Dome area has not stopped flowing. It's an oil exploration well which blew out on or about February 13, 2010 so severely that it deposited the Blow Out Preventer (BOP) and the steel well casing hundreds of yards away on the ocean floor. There is nothing there to cap or abate the oil flow with. It's an open hole that is nothing less than an oil, gas and tar volcano. While a certain leaking BP well may have been capped seven miles northeast of the Biloxi Dome area, an already large underwater lake of oil at an approximate 3,000 foot depth is rapidly growing each hour. It's estimated 9 mile length in May 2010 is surely dwarfed in size now.

Don't be fooled by the lack of surface oil being reported by the mainstream media shills and BP. Corexit hides what is beneath and Corexit is more toxic than crude oil itself. The only people denying the existence of the underwater plumes are the people at BP. And they offer no evidence to contradict the extremely solid evidence provided by four universities, including LSU, of the existence of these huge underwater plumes of oil.

In rather alarmist terms, the article warns that the entire nation will be affected by the "BP Flu", because the oil and methane continuing to flood the Gulf of Mexico from the Biloxi Dome area will in turn result in more toxins released into the water and the air. Gradually currents will bring these substances inland. Presumably Corexit will continue to be applied to the gulf in order to keep up the appearance that everything is fine; and the Corexit disperant will also aid in the propagation of microparticles. "While the Blue Flu symptoms are increasing for more and more people, those who have had 30+ days of direct exposure to the toxic and oxygen depleted Gulf air and water are in immediate danger of permanent and irreversible biological damage... if not death."

We caution the reader that everything in the World Vision Portal post is hearsay so far, but it echoes and dovetails with verifiable similar cases. It's also extremely well-written and motivates us to keep an eye on the story and research the matter further ourselves.

Developing...

Matt Simmons Found Dead

Breaking news: Matt Simmons, famous for his controversial criticisms of BP and calls for full disclosure regarding the true nature of the oil disaster in the Gulf, is dead.

From WLBZ:

The Knox County Sheriff's Department says Matthew Simmons, the founder of the Ocean Energy Institute, drowned at his house on North Haven late Sunday night.

Simmons was a leading investment banker for the energy industry and had recently retired to work full time on the new Ocean Energy Institute.

He was a leading proponent of offshore wind power and had started raising money to develop and build offshore turbines.

Oil Spill Epidemic

Why are oil spills suddenly occurring constantly, all over the world? Just this year, the environment has taken an unprecedented beating, from the oil industry alone.

There's now a leak of an oil pipeline in the Kalamazoo River, Michigan. So far, an estimated 840,000 gallons of oil has gushed into a creek that directly flows into the river.

Meanwhile, the Chinese oil spill has been contained before it reached international waters, the Chinese government assures us. (Then again, this is the same Chinese government that kills political dissidents, censors the internet, and initially lied about culpability in scandals over poisonous pet food, poisonous milk, contaminated pharamaceuticals, and toxic drywall.)

The Egyptian government similarly tried to keep the truth quiet about the Geisum oil leak in the Red Sea, and we're still in the dark about what's really been going on over there.

And in the North Sea last month, an oil leak occurred at the Maersk Resolute drilling platform near Denmark.

An American oil rig owned by Taylor Energy was discovered to be leaking when a research accidentally noticed it on satellite imagery while seeking images of the nearby BP leak.

And of course, the BP leak still continues unfixed to this day, with growing concerns about potentially catastrophic damage beneath the sea floor.

Chinese Oil Spill Grows

While much of the world's attention remains fixed on the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, another oil spill is destroying sea life on the other side of the globe.

A Chinese oil pipeline has been spewing crude oil into China's Yellow Sea for five days now, as the Associated Press reports:

China's largest reported oil spill had more than doubled by Wednesday, closing beaches on the Yellow Sea and prompting an environmental official to warn the sticky black crude posed a "severe threat" to sea life and water quality.

Some workers trying to clean up the inky beaches wore little more than rubber gloves, complicating efforts, one official said. But 40 oil-control boats and hundreds of fishing boats were also deployed in the area.

"I've been to a few bays today and discovered they were almost entirely covered with dark oil," said Zhong Yu, a worker with the environmental group Greenpeace China, who spent Wednesday on a boat inspecting the spill.

"The oil is half-solid and half liquid and is as sticky as asphalt," she told The Associated Press.

The oil was spread over 165 square miles (430 square kilometers) of water five days since a pipeline at a busy northeastern port exploded.

The Chinese government-controlled media has stated that no more oil is leaking into the Yellow Sea, yet outside observers maintain that the oil slick is continuing to grow.

The Truth is Seeping Out

The mainstream media is finally starting to overtly acknowledge what we have been warning about for some time now - that the undersea oil seeps could be a dangerous indicator of massive damage to the ocean floor and its underground infrastructure. Says the Associated Press:

The federal government Monday allowed BP to keep the cap shut tight on its busted Gulf of Mexico oil well for another day despite a seep in the sea floor after the company promised to watch closely for signs of new leaks underground, settling for the moment a rift between BP and the government.

Late Sunday, [Thad] Allen said a seep had been detected a distance from the busted oil well and demanded in a sharply worded letter that BP step up monitoring of the ocean floor.

White House energy adviser Carol Browner told the CBS "Early Show" the seep was found less than two miles from the well site.

When asked about the seep and the monitoring, BP spokesman Mark Salt would only say that "we continue to work very closely with all government scientists on this."

"Clearly we want this to end. But we don't want to enter into a situation where we have uncontrolled leaks all over the Gulf floor," Browner told ABC.

Scientists still aren't sure whether the pressure readings mean a leak elsewhere in the well bore, possibly deep down in bedrock, which could make the seabed unstable. Oil would have to be released into the water to relieve pressure and allow crews to hook up the ships, BP and Allen have said.

On July 15, MSNBC aired a very candid interview with Matt Simmons (founder of the Ocean Energy Institute) in which he blew the whistle about a "massive hole" spewing oil and methane, miles from the original BP disaster site. "It's a big lie", declared Simmons regarding the official position that there is only one leak and that the cap is working. (Also referenced on MSNBC here.)

If there is substantial damage beneath the sea floor - and there is every indication of it - the implications for the environment are serious. When capping one leak, the extreme pressure of the oil and methane beneath the sea bed will obviously seek another path at whatever weakest point it can find. It's like when your roof leaks and you patch up the affected part of your ceiling with plaster - next time it rains, the water will simply go around it and pop up somewhere else nearby, wherever it can. BP's historically unprecedented deep drilling may have created an ecological problem that cannot easily be fixed.

Oil Found Inside Crab Larvae

McClatchy is reporting on a sickening discovery that BP oil has likely entered our food chain:

Scientists with the University of Southern Mississippi and Tulane University in New Orleans have found droplets of oil in the larvae of blue crabs and fiddler crabs sampled from Louisiana to Pensacola, Fla.

"I think we will see this enter the food chain in a lot of ways — for plankton feeders, like menhaden, they are going to just actively take it in," said Harriet Perry, director of the Center for Fisheries Research and Development at the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory. "Fish are going to feed on (crab larvae). We have also just started seeing it on the fins of small, larval fish — their fins were encased in oil. That limits their mobility, so that makes them easy prey for other species. The oil's going to get into the food chain in a lot of ways."

Perry said researchers have not yet linked the hydrocarbons found in the crab larvae to the BP disaster, but she has little doubt it's the source. She said she has never seen such contamination in her 42 years of studying blue crab.

Obama Administration Bans All Media From BP Disaster Area

Admiral Thad Allen, who is appointed to oversee the BP disaster site for the Coast Guard and the Obama administration, has issued a bizarre directive of Orwellian proportions: it is now a felony to approach within 65 feet of the cleanup efforts, including booms. And scarier still, we're told that they originally wanted the keep-away zone to be 300 feet. This effectively destroys the media's ability to cover the scene and to talk to cleanup workers.

Allen's rationale for this? He claims: "I actually had some personal complaints from some county commissioners in Florida and some other local mayors that thought that there was a chance that somebody would get hurt." And yet, no one investigating this story has been able to locate these alleged commissioners and mayors who supposedly complained. As far as we know, such officials want more coverage and information about what's really going on, not less.

The cognitive dissonance of issuing this absurd and un-American violation of the First Amendment here on the Fourth of July weekend is just too ironic. Already, we're hearing talk from lifelong Democrats about opposing Obama in the next election, specifically over this issue. (We here at Meta-Oceanic are as apolitical as they come, but if Obama doesn't step forward and countermand this Government-imposed media blackout order fairly immediately, he's lost our confidence as well. The "transparency" that Obama and Allen have spoken of so often has turned out to be precisely the same sort of bullying tactics and coverup activity we've seen in previous administrations.)

Several prominent citizens and members of the media, including Louisiana politician Billy Nungesser, have already publicly stated their intent to flout this new law.

Click here to view CNN's Anderson Cooper expressing outrage about being prevented from properly covering this story. Another copy of the video is here.

BP Disaster Fund: We Can't Afford to Pay All Claims

From The Age:

The man appointed by US President Barack Obama to manage BP's oil spill disaster fund has warned that ''there's not enough money in the world'' to pay all claims, and suggested home owners with plunging property values could lose out.

The warning from prominent US lawyer Kenneth Feinberg came as hurricane Alex disrupted clean-up operations in the Gulf of Mexico and pushed oil deeper into fragile coastal wetlands and once-pristine beaches.

Mr Feinberg, asked by Mr Obama to administer the $US20 billion ($A23.5 billion) claims fund, insisted BP would ''pay every eligible claim'', but cautioned that many perceived damages may not qualify.

''I use that famous example of a restaurant in Boston that says, 'I can't get shrimp from Louisiana, and my menu suffers and my business is off,' '' Mr Feinberg told the House of Representatives committee on small business.

''Well, no law is going to recognise that claim.''

He said he was still sorting out how to deal with indirect claims such as hotels that lose bookings because tourists think beaches are covered in oil, or people whose property values decline but who live several blocks from an oil-affected beach.

''There's no question that the property value has diminished as a result of the spill. That doesn't mean that every property is entitled to compensation,'' he said. ''There's not enough money in the world to pay everybody who'd like to have money.''

Genetically Modified Salmon Coming Soon

A genetically altered salmon that will grow at twice the natural rate - 18 months rather than the usual three years - is on its way to your dinner table.

The FDA is close to approving the product, called AquAdvantage salmon, having already acknowledged that it meets at least five of their seven criteria. If this growth-hormone-laden "Frankenfish" passes, it will be the first GMO animal ever approved for eating.

The FDA are already arguing amongst themselves about whether or not to require that the fish be labeled as GMO. GMO plants currently have no such requirement - and if they did, almost everything would be labeled, because soy and corn are ubiquitious in American food products, and 95 percent of all soybeans and 80 percent of all corn grown in the United States is genetically altered.

According to the New York Times:

The salmon’s approval would help open a path for companies and academic scientists developing other genetically engineered animals, like cattle resistant to mad cow disease or pigs that could supply healthier bacon. Next in line behind the salmon for possible approval would probably be the “enviropig,” developed at a Canadian university, which has less phosphorus pollution in its manure.

Critics say the drug evaluation process does not allow full assessment of the possible environmental impacts of genetically altered animals and also blocks public input. “There is no opportunity for anyone from the outside to see the data or criticize it,” said Margaret Mellon, director of the food and environment program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. When consumer groups were invited to discuss biotechnology policy with top F.D.A. officials last month, Ms. Mellon said she warned the officials that approval of the salmon would generate “a firestorm of negative response.”

Fossils of Complex Life Forms From Over Two Billion Years Ago Discovered

From Science Daily:

The discovery in Gabon of more than 250 fossils in an excellent state of conservation has provided proof, for the first time, of the existence of multicellular organisms 2.1 billion years ago. This finding represents a major breakthrough: until now, the first complex life forms (made up of several cells) dated from around 600 million years ago.

Until now, it has been assumed that organized multicellular life appeared around 0.6 billion years ago and that before then the Earth was mainly populated by microbes (viruses, bacteria, parasites, etc.). This new discovery moves the cursor of the origin of multicellular life back by 1.5 billion years and reveals that cells had begun to cooperate with each other to form more complex and larger structures than single-celled organisms.